Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/March 29

March 29
 * 2012 – Venezuelan Air Force AS332B1 Super Puma crashes near Chparralito, Venezuela on an anti-narcotics mission, killing all seven on board.
 * 2011 – A U.S. Marine Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion crashes in Kaneohe Bay, killing one and injuring three crew members.
 * 2011 – A U.S. Navy Lockheed P-3 Orion fires at a Libyan Navy patrol vessel that has launched missiles at merchant ships in the port of Misrata. A U.S. Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt II attacks two smaller Libyan vessels accompanying the patrol vessel, sinking one and forcing the other to be abandoned.
 * 2010 – A Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter of the U.S Army crashed in Forward Operating Base Atgar in the Zabul province of Afghanistan.
 * 2006 – The Sea Harrier was withdrawn from service.
 * 2003 – First flight of the Ullmann 2000 Panther prototype N202 kT
 * 2001 – X-32 B Joint Strike Fighter Concept Demonstration Aircraft makes its first flight.
 * 2001 – In the 2001 Avjet Aspen crash, an Avjet charter flight, a Gulfstream III jet with 15 passengers and 3 crew, crashes on approach into Aspen, Colorado, killing all on board.
 * 1999 – RQ-4 Global Hawk #2 prototype crashes at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake.
 * 1998 – A Peruvian Air Force Antonov An-32, FAP-388/OB-1388, carrying villagers affected by floods, crashes in Piura, Peru after engine failure. Of the 55 people on board, 22 are killed.
 * 1996 – First flight of the Lockheed Martin RQ-3 DarkStar
 * 1990 – First flight of the Ilyushin Il-114.
 * 1985 – Two Canadian Forces Lockheed CC-130H Hercules, 130330 and 130331, both of 435 Squadron, crashes after having a mid-air collision over CFB Namao, near Edmonton, Alberta. This is the only dual Hercules mid-air collision.
 * 1981 – British Airways makes its last Vickers VC10 flight
 * 1979 – Quebecair Flight 255, a Fairchild F-27, crashes after an explosion in an engine, killing 17 of 24 on board.
 * 1965 – William Oefelein, American Astronaut, was born. William Anthony “Bill” Oefelein is an American Naval officer and former NASA astronaut. He flew as pilot of the STS-116 space shuttle mission.
 * 1960 – First flight of the Tupolev Tu-124
 * 1959 – Barthélemy Boganda, the prime minister of the Central African Republic autonomous territory (the future Central African Republic) dies when his plane explodes in mid-air over Boukpoyanga, killing all on board.
 * 1951 – Flight Safety Inc. begins operations at the Marine Air Terminal at LaGuardia Airport, New York with just one secretary and rented late night hours on a Link trainer simulator.
 * 1945 – Germany launches the final wartime V2 rocket, soon followed by the end of the war in Europe the defeat of Germany.
 * 1944 – (29–30) Bougainville-based Air Solomons (AirSols) aircraft make daylight raids against Japanese bases at Truk Atoll.
 * 1944 – (Overnight) U.S. Kwajalein-based bombers make night attacks on Truk Atoll on four consecutive evenings.
 * 1942 – HMS Eagle makes the third delivery of Spitfires to Malta, flying off seven.
 * 1942 – The production of Spitfire aircraft reached an all-time peak in one day, 134 aircraft.
 * 1942 – (Overnight) In an experiment to see whether a first wave of bombers could start a conflagration in a city center that would guide later waves of bombers to the city during an area bombing attack, 234 British bombers attack Lübeck, Germany. The experiment succeeds, with the center of Lübeck largely destroyed and over 300 people killed.
 * 1939 – The Curtiss YP-37 enters service with the U.S Army Air Corps
 * 1936 – First flight of the Vought V-141
 * 1920 – Croydon replaces Hounslow as London's airport
 * 1912 – Hanna Reitsch, German test pilot, was born (d. 1979). Reitsch was a famous female German test pilot. Several of her later international gliding records are still standing in 2008. Reitsch was born in Hirschberg, Silesia. The daughter of an ophthalmologist, she studied to become a medical doctor and in 1932 began her aviation career. She was a test pilot on the Junkers Ju 87 Stuka and Dornier Do 17 projects and was one of the few pilots to fly the Focke-Achgelis Fa 61, the first fully controllable helicopter.
 * 1858 – Two men – Brown and Dean – make the first balloon flight in Australia in a hydrogen balloon named the Australasian.