Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/August

August 2

• 2013 – British Airways flight 902, an Airbus A380 (G-XLEA), operates the 1st fare paying flight for the new British Airways A380 fleet to Frankfurt. Departing London Heathrow at just after 7am.

• 2010 – Todd Reichert of the University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies pilots a human-powered ornithopter, Snowbird, in Ontario, sustaining 19.3 seconds of flight, covering a distance of 145 metres (475 ft). The 42.6 kg (92.59 lb) craft has 32-metre- (105-foot-) span flapping wings.[1]

• 2009 – Merpati Nusantara Airlines Flight 9760, a de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter, crashes into a mountain in good weather over Indonesia, killing all 13 passengers and 3 crew.

• 2005 – Air France Flight 358, an Airbus A340-300, skids off a runway in Toronto, Ontario, while landing and catches fire; all 309 on board escape without fatalities or serious injuries, but the aircraft is completely destroyed by the fire.

• 1991 – Launch: Space Shuttle Columbia STS-43 at 11:01:59 am EDT. Mission highlights: TDRS deployment.

• 1990 – (2-4) Iraq invades and occupies Kuwait. At the time, the United States Navy aircraft carrier USS Independence (CV-62) is in the northern Arabian Sea; during the month, additional aircraft carriers will deploy to within striking range of Iraq and Kuwait, with USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69) deploying to the eastern Mediterranean Sea and then the Red Sea, and USS Saratoga (CV-60) departing Norfolk, Virginia, to deploy to the Red Sea. USS John F. Kennedy (CV-67) relieves Dwight D. Eisenhower in the Red Sea in mid-August.

• 1990 – British Airways Flight 149 was a flight from London Heathrow Airport to Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport, (the former international airport for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia), via Kuwait City and Madras (now called Chennai) operated by British Airways Boeing 747-136 G-AWND. The flight never travelled on after stopping at Kuwait International Airport, near Kuwait City, several hours after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. The aircraft operating the flight, its passengers and crew were captured by Iraqi forces and many of the passengers and crew were initially detained and later became part of the ‘Human Shield’. One passenger, a member of the Kuwaiti Royal Family, was killed by the Iraqis, most of the remaining passengers were later freed, though at least one died during captivity, and the aircraft was destroyed, still on the airport, near its original landing gate. Allegations that the airline deliberately did not divert, so as to insert British covert operatives, form the basis of at least one court case.

• 1985 – Delta Air Lines Flight 191, a Lockheed Tristar, crashes on approach to Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport because of wind shear from a sudden microburst thunderstorm. Of the 163 passengers and crew aboard, 27 survive.

• 1984 – Vieques Air Link Flight 901A, a Britten-Norman Islander, crashes on take=off from Vieques Airport, Vieques, Puerto Rico, due to mixing of water and gas on left engine, killing eight passengers and its lone crew member, its pilot.

• 1981 – Fuerza Aérea Panamena de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter 300, FAP-205, c/n 284, departs Penonomé, Panama at 1140 hrs. for Coclecito, Panama, with two crew and Panama's President General Omar Torrijos and four of his aides aboard. Before reaching the destination the airplane flew into the side of Marta Mountain at an altitude of 3,400 ft. at ~1200 hrs., killing all seven.

• 1979 – Cessna 501, N15NY. Thurman Munson, catcher for the New York Yankees, died in a crash of his personal jet while practicing touch-and-go landings at Akron-Canton Regional Airport.

• 1966 – First flight of the Sukhoi Su-17 was 1 Jul 1969.[2]. However, the Su-7IG, a converted Su-7BM,first flew on 2 Aug 1966 with V. S. Ilyushin at the controls, becoming the first Soviet variable geometry aircraft.[3]

• 1964 – US Navy aircraft are involved in skirmishes in the Gulf of Tonkin. F-8 Crusaders sink a North Vietnamese torpedo boat

• 1960 – First flight of the Bennett Airtruck

• 1947 – Star Dust (registration G-AGWH) was a British South American Airways (BSAA) Avro Lancastrian airliner which disappeared in mysterious circumstances on 2 August 1947 during a flight from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Santiago, Chile. A comprehensive search of a wide area (including what is now known to have been the crash site) discovered no wreckage, and the true fate of the aircraft and its passengers and crew remained a mystery for over fifty years. Speculation about the cause and nature of the disappearance of Star Dust included theories of international intrigue, intercorporate sabotage, or abduction by aliens.

• 1945 – 855 B-29 Superfortresses drop 5,987,481 kilograms (13,200,136 lb) of bombs on Toyama, Tachikawa, and other cities in Japan. The attack on Toyama is an incendiary raid that destroys almost the entire city.

• 1945 – A U. S. Navy PV-1 Ventura patrol plane discovers survivors of the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis (CA-35), the first indication that Indianapolis is even missing, 84 hours after she had been sunk by the Japanese submarine I-58 in the Philippine Sea. A large air-sea rescue operation lasts until August 8, but saves only 316 of her crew of 1,199.

• 1943 – The 1943 Liberator crash at Whenuapai was an aircraft accident in New Zealand during World War II. The C-87 Liberator Express aircraft, owned by the USAAF and operated by United Airlines, was transferring Japanese men, women and children of the Consular Corps, to exchange for Allied POWs. On 2 August 1943, it took off from Whenuapai Aerodrome runway 04 at 2:20 am, with rain and fog conditions at minimums for departure, and quickly passed through low stratus. Captain Herschel Laughlin’s gyro horizon had inadvertently been left caged – while the instrument displayed level flight, the aircraft entered a steepening bank to the left. The crew detected the problem in a few seconds, but as the aircraft was straightening up and levelling out, it hit the ground at about 200 mph (320 km/h), bounced a few times and exploded. The third bounce threw its first officer, R. John Wisda, out through the canopy; he rolled end over end about 100 m (330 ft) through mud and reeds. A medic later found him trying to keep warm near a burning tyre. The major factors of the accident were the lack of a pre-flight checklist, and crew fatigue (126 flying hours in the last 26 days). The crash killed three of the five crew (United States nationals), and eleven of the twenty-five passengers (eight Japanese and three Thai nationals). Two additional passengers died later from injuries.

• 1943 – (2-3) The final raid of the Battle of Hamburg, by 740 British bombers, fails when the bombers scatter their bombs widely. Thirty British aircraft do not return. Despite the enormnous damage it has inflicted, Operation Gomorrah has failed to completely destroy Hamburg.

• 1943 – Boeing B-17E Flying Fortress, 41-2463, "Yankee Doodle", of the 19th Bomb Group, then to 394th Bomb Squadron, 5th Bomb Group, crashes on takeoff due mechanical failure at Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides, Bombardier Sgt. John P. Kruger and navigator Lt. Talbert H. Woolam are killed. Pilot was Gene Roddenberry, future creator of Star Trek. The airframe was stricken on 13 August 1943.

• 1940 – As one of the components of Operation Hurry, the first of many operations in which Royal Air Force fighters fly off Allied aircraft carriers for service at Malta, twelve Fairey Swordfish from the British aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal make the first night raid on Italian soil in the early morning hours, attacking Cagliari in southern Sardinia. They inflict heavy damage on the airfield and on Italian seaplanes anchored in the harbor and drop naval mines into the harbor. Two Swordfish are lost. Nine accompanying Blackburn Skuas shoot down an Italian Cant Z.501. It is a diversionary attack to cover the carrier HMS Argus, which flies off 12 RAF Hawker Hurricanes to Malta from a point south of Sardinia later in the day.

• 1929 – (2-10) The English aviatrix and ornithologist Mary Russell, Duchess of Bedford, her personal pilot C. D. Barnard, and mechanic Robert Little make a record-breaking flight in the Fokker F.VII Spider (G-EBTS) of 10,000 mi (16,000 km) from Lympne Airport in Lympne, England, to Karachi, then in the British Indian Empire, and back to Croydon Airport in South London, England, in eight days.

• 1925 – The only Viking IV stationed at Ottawa was the British-built G-CYES and it was written off.

• 1924 – One of the three surviving Douglas World Cruiser aircraft, the "Boston", 23-1231, c/n 147, loses oil pressure while flying west over the North Atlantic, has to alight on the open sea. Crew is rescued, but during an attempt to tow the float plane by the USS Richmond, the aircraft capsizes in rough seas and has to be abandoned near the Faroe Islands.

• 1923 – First flight of the Wright F2W

• 1919 – A 1919 Caproni Ca.48 crash at Verona, Italy, during a flight from Venice to Taliedo, Milan, kills all on board (14, 15, or 17 people, according to different sources).

• 1917 – Squadron Commander Edwin Dunning of the British Royal Naval Air Service becomes the first pilot to land an airplane on the deck of a moving ship when he puts a Sopwith Pup down on HMS Furious.

• 1916 – (2-16) German Zeppelins raid southeast England. Lieutenant William Leefe-Robinson, Royal Flying Corps, shoots down Zeppelin SL 11 in a BE.2c.

• 1916 – A Bristol Scout C from the Royal Navy seaplane carrier Vindex unsuccessfully attacks the German Zeppelin L 17. It is the first interception of an airship by a carrier-based aircraft.

• 1915 – Building upon 1913 flying-off experiments aboard HMS Hermes, an aircraft takes off from a platform aboard a fully operational British aviation ship for the first time, when a Sopwith Baby equipped with wheeled floats takes off from HMS Campania.

• 1911 – The first woman in the United States licensed as a qualified pilot is Harriet Quimby, a drama critic.

• 1909 – The first flying machine purchased and put into service by a government is the Wright Flyer. The US Army accepts its first airplane and pays the Wrights $25,000, plus a $5,000 bonus, because the machine exceeded the speed requirement of 40 mph.

August 3

• 2011 – The International Federation of Journalists condemns the 30 July NATO bombing of the Libyan Jamahiriya Broadcasting Corporation in an attempt to knock Libyan state television off the air, allegedly killing three journalists and wounding another 15.[1]

• 2010 – Katekavia Flight 9357, an Antonov An-24 crashes on approach to Igarka Airport, Russia, killing twelve people.

• 2009 – Saha Air Lines Flight 124, a Boeing 707-3 J9 C, registration EP-SHK, suffers engine fires in both port engines shortly after take-off from Ahwaz Airport, Iran. The fires are extinguished and a successful two-engine emergency landing is made back at the airport. The aircraft is substantially damaged.

• 2007 – First flight of the Northrop Grumman E-2D Hawkeye

• 2000 – First flight of the Boeing 737-900

• 1995 – (Aug 3, 1995 – Aug Ai 16, 1996) Airstan incident was a 1995 international incident involving Russia and the Taliban of Afghanistan. Taliban-controlled planes hijacked a Russian Ilyushin Il-76 plane with seven Russian nationals on board to land not at their Kabul destination but at Taliban-occupied Kandahar. The men were held prisoner for one year before being able to overpower their captors. After restarting their plane they were able to fly to freedom.

• 1994 – First Jordanian plane to fly over Israeli airspace (King Hussein pilot).

• 1989 – Olympic Aviation Flight 545, a Shorts 330-220, crashes into Mount Kerkis in Greece. All 34 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 1984 – Terrorists set off a bomb at Madras Airport (MAA), killing 32 people.

• 1981 – In the United States, Air traffic controllers affiliated with the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization walk off the job. President Ronald Reagan ultimately responds on August 5th, by firing those who ignore his order to return to work.

• 1975 – The Agadir air disaster: an Air Maroc-operated Boeing 707 owned by Royal Jordanian Airlines crashes while on approach to Agadir, Morocco due to pilot error; all 188 on board die in the worst ever accident involving the Boeing 707.

• 1967 – A USAF de Havilland Canada C-7B Caribou, 62-4161, c/n 99, 'KE' tailcode, of the 459th TAS, 483d TAW, plunges to earth minus its tail from low altitude after being hit by US 155 mm artillery "friendly fire" on approach to Duc Pho Special Forces camp, Vietnam. Three crew killed, pilot Capt. Alan Eugene Hendrickson, co-pilot John Dudley Wiley, and loadmaster TSgt. Zane Aubry Carter. Dramatic photo of plunging aircraft taken by Japanese combat photographer Hiromichi Mine, who was himself killed in the line of duty 5 March 1968 from injuries suffered from a landmine.

• 1966 – The U. S. Navy ends aircraft carrier deployments to Dixie Station off South Vietnam.

• 1961 – A Royal Canadian Air Force Lancaster aircraft photographed the largest non-nuclear explosion ever conducted at the time, at Suffield Experimental Station in Alberta.

• 1955 – President Eisenhower signs the Civilian Airport Modernization Bill. The legislation establishes a long-term program of federal government aid toward the construction of airports in the United States.

• 1954 – First flight of the Rolls-Royce Thrust Measuring Rig (free flight).

• 1950 – United States Marine Corps air operations over Korea commence, with VMF-214 flying strike missions from USS Sicily

• 1947 – A Tushino air parade in Moscow, USSR, presents the newest Soviet jets including among others: Yak-19, La-150, La-156, La-160, Su-9, Su-11.

• 1945 – First flight of the Kyushu J7W

• 1940 – Seaplane Clare makes first British passenger flight to the US.

• 1930 – The Imperial Japanese Navy practices dive bombing for the first time, using fighters to sink the retired protected cruiser Akashi with 4-kg (8.8-lb) practice bombs in Tokyo Bay.

• 1926 – The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) began operations with Canadian Vickers Vedette flying boats, with a base at Lac du Bonnet, Manitoba.

• 1921 – Lieutenant John A. Macready of the U. S. Army Air Corps finds a new use for airplanes when he sprays a patch of ground infested with caterpillars. This practice becomes known as crop dusting.

• 1914 – France and Belgium enter World War I when Germany invades Belgium and declares war on France.

• 1914 – The Imperial German Navy leases the cargo-passenger ship Answald for conversion into Germany’s first seaplane carrier, SMS Answald, designated Flugzeugmutterschiff I (Airplane Mothership I).

• 1909 – The Silver Dart, Canada’s first aircraft, crash landed at Petawawa, Ontario.

• 1904 – In a dirigible named California Arrow, Major Thomas Scott Baldwin carries out the first circular flight by an airship in America at Oakland, California. Powered by a converted motorcycle engine, it is built and dispatched by Glenn Curtiss.

• 1861 – John La Mountain becomes the first balloonist to use boats for aerial operations in a military conflict. Using the Union tug Fanny, he ascends from its deck to a height of 2,000 ft. to conduct aerial reconnaissance of Confederate forces during America’s Civil War.

August 4

• 2009 – Bangkok Airways Flight 266, an ATR 72-200 carrying 68 passengers crashes in severe weather on landing at Samui airport in the resort island of Ko Samui in Thailand, resulting in at least 1 confirmed death and 37 injuries.

• 2007 – NASA’s Phoenix spacecraft launches from Cape Canaveral, en route to a landing on Mars which would take place on May 25th, 2008.

• 2007 – A suitcase containing US$800,000 in undeclared cash is discovered while being x-rayed at Aeroparque Jorge Newbery in Buenos Aires, sparking an international rift between Argentina and Venezuela known as “Maletinazo, ” or “the suitcase incident. ”

• 1992 – An Lockheed F-117A Nighthawk, 85-801, "The Perpetrator", goes out of control after take off for a night training mission from Holloman AFB, New Mexico. Pilot Capt. John B. Mills of the 416th Fighter Squadron, ejects safely, suffering only minor cuts. Airframe comes down in sparsely populated area near a trailer park. Investigators believed that an improperly-reinstalled bleed air duct led to control failure.

• 1973 – First of two prototype Boeing YQM-94A Compass Cope B long-range remotely piloted vehicles (RPV), possibly serial 70-1839, crashed during its second test flight. The USAF decides not to order the Compass Copes into production. Second prototype is now on display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force, Dayton, Ohio.

• 1971 – First flight of the AgustaWestland AW109

• 1959 – The first medical evacuation by helicopter from a Mobile Army Surgery Hospital (MASH) team takes place when an S-51 helicopter flies out a casualty from a fire flight along the Pusan Perimeter.

• 1954 – First flight of the English Electric Lightning P.1A.

• 1952 – Off Korea, the explosion of an aircraft fuel tank causes a fire on the flight deck of the U. S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Boxer (CV-21) which kills nine and injures 30 men and destroys or damages 18 aircraft.

• 1943 – North American XB-28A-NA, 40-3058, c/n 67-3417, crashes into the Pacific Ocean off California after the crew bails out. Project not proceeded with.

• 1943 – F/L AA Bishop and crew in a Short Sunderland of No. 423 Squadron sank the German submarine U-489. The Sunderland was shot down; five crew were lost and six saved.

• 1943 – The U. S. Army Air Forces’ Eleventh Air Force flies 135 sorties against Kiska in the Aleutian Islands, dropping 304,000 pounds (137,893 kg) of bombs.

• 1943 – German aircraft again attack the harbor at Palermo, damaging the American destroyer USS Shubrick (DD-639).

• 1929 – 4-16 – The first International Tourist Aircraft Contest Challenge 1929 in Paris, with 5,942 km race over Europe, won by the German crew of Fritz Morzik on the BFW M.23 plane.

• 1924 – The attempt of the Royal Air Force team of MacLaren, Plenderleith, and Andrews to circumnavigate the world eastbound ends when they are forced down in the Bering Sea by fog and their Vickers Vulture amphibian is irreparably damaged. They taxi to safety at Bering Island in the Commander Islands. They had covered 13,100 miles (21,095 km) in 130 days.

• 1914 – The United Kingdom enters World War I, declaring war on Germany.

• 1908 – Wilbur Wright makes the first flight using stick controls near Le Mans, France. The flight lasts 1 min and 45 seconds.

• 1908 – Count von Zeppelin takes the LZ4 on a 24-hour flight from Lake Constance, down the Rhine to Basel, then to Strasbourg and Mainz and back to Stuttgart, a total non-stop distance of 435 miles.

• 1901 – Octave Chanute arrives at the Wright brothers’ camp at Kill Devil Hill and photographs their flight tests with the 1901 glider.

• 1807 – Andre-Jacques Garnerin in Paris, France makes the first night ascent in a balloon.

August 5

• 2012 – An Israeli airstrike halts an attempt by a group of gunmen to use commandeered Egyptian armored vehicles to ram their way through an Israeli border crossing from Egypt into Israel.[1]

• 2011 – The International News Safety Institute asks Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon to investigate whether the 30 July NATO airstrike against the Libyan Jamahiriya Broadcasting Corporation violated a United Nations Security Council Resolution that prohbits attacks on journalists.[2]

• 2009 – SATA International Flight 466, an Airbus A320-214, registration CS-TKO, makes a very heavy landing at Lisbon Portela Airport, Portugal, with a force of 4.6G being recorded. The aircraft is substantially damaged but may have flown twice since.

• 2009 – A Pakistan Air Force Chengdu FT-7 crashes near Attock, northwest Pakistan, killing the pilot.

• 2004 – UH-1N Huey 160439 from HMM-166 shot down near Najaf; crew wounded.[3] Helicopter was later written off.[4]

• 1994 – USAF A-10 Thunderbolt IIs attack and destroy a Serbian anti-tank gun

• 1994 – Clive Robertson Caldwell, British fighter pilot, dies at 84.

• 1989 – Piedmont Airlines is merged into USAir.

• 1984 – An Aeroflot Antonov AN-12 loses all four engines after flying into heavy hail and crashes in Pakistan, killing all 23 aboard.

• 1981 – Ronald Reagan fires 11,359 striking air-traffic controllers who ignored his order for them to return to work.

• 1973 – First flight of the Trident TR-1 Trigull

• 1973 – Arab terrorists open fire inside and toss grenades inside a terminal at Athens Airport, killing three and injuring 55. The attack was intended for passengers traveling to Israel, but the Tel Aviv flight had already departed—most of the victims were waiting for a flight to New York. The attackers are captured and executed.

• 1971 – Entered Service: McDonnell Douglas DC-10 with American Airlines

• 1970 – A USAF McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II of the 36th TFW, Bitburg, Germany, TDY to Zaragoza Air Base, Spain, crashes on a gunnery range 25 miles from Zaragoza, killing pilot Capt. Charles A. Baldwin, 28, of Charleston, West Virginia, and navigator Capt. Stephen N. Smith, 27, of Pinebrook, New Jersey.

• 1969 – The space probe Mariner 7 makes its closest approach to Mars, beaming back photos and data from just around 10,000 miles above the Martian surface.

• 1966 – The Soviet Union protests damage to one of its merchant ships in a North Vietnamese port due to American air attacks.

• 1964 – US Navy aircraft attack North Vietnamese naval bases, spearheading direct US involvement in the Vietnam War.

• 1954 – As the first pre-production Douglas A2D-1 Skyshark, BuNo 125480, piloted by George Jansen, is flown on a test flight out of Edwards AFB, California, the temperamental gearbox transferring the Allison XT-40A power to counter-rotating propellers fails, and even though the powerplant continues to partially function, the props automatically feather. Unable to spot a reasonable landing spot, the pilot ejects, suffering back injuries that leave him a plaster cast for several months. The Skyshark program is cancelled one month later, with only six of ten pre-production A2D-1s completed ever being flown.

• 1952 – Convair B-36D-25-CF Peacemaker, 49-2661, c/n 121, on bailment to Convair, San Diego, California, crashes into San Diego Bay at 1430 PDT, while on a normal shakedown flight following completion of "San-San" project modification. The number 5 engine catches fire in flight and then falls off the wing. The aircraft is destroyed by impact and explosion. Four of the eight crewmembers, all Convair flight test employees, receive minor injuries, two are uninjured, and two are lost, first flight engineer W. W. Hoffman, by drowning, while the pilot, David H. Franks, 40, stays with the plane to manoeuvre it out to sea and away from occupied land. His body is never found. Coast Guard planes rescue four and Navy ships pick up two. The rescued, none seriously injured, are R. W. Adkins, co-pilot; Kenneth Rogers, flight engineer, W. F. Ashmore, Roy E. Sommers, D. R. Maxion and W. E. Wilson, all of San Diego. The UB88 Project dive team determined that the bomber actually came down in the Pacific off of Mission Beach.

• 1951 – First flight of the HAL HT-2

• 1950 – AA USAF Boeing B-29-85-BW Superfortress, 44-87651, of the 99th Bomb Squadron, 9th Bomb Group, 9th Bomb Wing, carrying a Mark 4 nuclear bomb, suffers two runaway propellers and landing gear problems on takeoff at Fairfield-Suisun Air Force Base, Fairfield, California. The crew attempts an emergency landing but crashes, causing a huge explosion that kills 19 aboard the plane and on the ground, including mission commander Brig. Gen. Robert F. Travis; the airfield is later renamed Travis Air Force Base in his honor. Numerous nearby mobile homes are severely damaged and many civilians, firefighters, and USAF ground crew are injured- 60 required hospital treatment and 47 suffered superficial injuries according to newspaper reports, but other sources place the total as high as 173. The USAF attributes the explosion to ten or twelve conventional 500-pound HE bombs aboard the B-29 and claims that the nuclear bomb's fuel capsule was aboard a different aircraft, but admits that the bomb casing contained depleted uranium used as ballast, and later orders a public health assessment of the crash site.

• 1946 – Second (of only 14 built) Douglas C-74 Globemaster, 42-65403, c/n 13914, crashes at Torrance, California when it loses a wing during an overload dive test. All four crew bail out successfully.

• 1945 – First production Martin JRM-1 Mars flying boat, BuNo 76819 named "Hawaii Mars", crashes on test flight in the Chesapeake Bay after porpoising during landing - never delivered to the US Navy.

• 1944 – During test flight out of the Fisher plant at Cleveland, Ohio, third Fisher XP-75 Eagle, 44-32161, crashes at Fairfield Village, Ohio, three miles (5 km) N of Cleveland, after an explosion and fire at 23,000 feet (7,000 m) - pilot Russell Stuart Weeks bailed out at 4,000 feet (1,200 m).

• 1943 – The Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS) and the 319th Women’s Flying Training Detachment (WFTD), both organizations of civilian women ferry pilots employed by the U. S. Army Air Forces Air Transport Command, are merged to form the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP).

• 1940 – No. 2 SFTS was officially opened at Uplands Airport, Ontario, by the Governor-General.

• 1936 – Five Italian Savoia-Marchetti SM.81 bombers are among aircraft covering a convoy of merchant ships carrying 3,000 Nationalist soldiers and their equipment from Spanish Morocco to Spain.

• 1936 – Chicago and Southern Flight 4, a Lockheed Model 10 Electra, crashes after takeoff due to pilot error, killing all 8 on board.

• 1935 – Wiley Post, the first pilot to fly solo around the world, and his passenger Will Rogers are killed in a crash in Alaska.

• 1933 – 5-7 – Maurice Rossi and Paul Codes fly a Blériot 110 from New York to Rayal, Syria, establishing a new distance record of 9,104 km (5,657 miles).

• 1930 – Neil Armstrong, Ohio, X-15 pilot, 1st Moonwalker (Gemini 8, Apollo 11) was born.

• 1925 – Lloyd Aero Boliviano commences operations.

• 1918 – The commander of the Imperial German Navy’s Naval Airship Division, Fregattenkapitän Peter Strasser, is killed in action when the Zeppelin in which he is riding as an observer, L70, is shot down in flames over the coast of England.

• 1918 – The first American night patrol of the war takes place when a Felixstowe F.2 A flying boat crewed by Ens. Ashton W. Hawkins and Lt. George F. Lawrence take off on patrol from RAF Killinghome, England.

• 1917 – The first Aero Squadron of the Signal Corps leaves the United States for Europe under the command of Maj. Ralph Royce.

• 1905 – Nineteen-year old Welshman Ernest Willows makes the first flight of Willows No. 1 a semi-rigid airship he had built.

August 6

• 2009 – A Swedish Air Force Saab JAS 39 Gripen C from F 17 Kallinge Blekinge Air Force Wing suffered a heavy landing at Ronneby Airport, Sweden caused by the failure of the under-carriage to operate after a fire alarm was trigged and the pilot was uninjured in the incident.

• 2005 – Tuninter Flight 1153, an ATR 72, ditches into the sea near Palermo, Sicily with 35 passengers and 4 crew members on board; 14 passengers and 2 crew members die.

• 1997 – Korean Air Flight 801, a Boeing 747, crashes while attempting to land in heavy rain in Hagåtña, Guam. Of the 254 people on board, 228 die.

• 1996 – First flight of the Kawasaki OH-1

• 1990 – The United States issues its first orders deploying military forces in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, sending two squadrons of United States Air Force F-15 Eagle fighters to the Persian Gulf region and several U. S. Air Force B-52 Stratofortress bombers from the continental United States to Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.

• 1986 – First flight of the British Aerospace ATP

• 1974 – Turkish Air Force aircraft support a Turkish offensive at Karavas, Cyprus.

• 1969 – The biggest helicopter ever built, the Soviet Mil V-12 secures an unbeaten world lifting record for rotary-winged aircraft by carrying 40,205.5 kg (88,636 lb.) to a height of 2,255 m (7,400 ft.).

• 1969 – A sonic boom from an air show smashes windows in eight blocks of downtown Kelowna.

• 1966 – All 42 on board are killed when Braniff Flight 250, a BAC One-Eleven, flies into an active squall line and breaks apart in mid-air near Falls City, Nebraska.

• 1964 – The first North Vietnamese Air Force jet fighter unit, Fighter Regiment No. 921 (the “Red Star Squadron”), arrives in North Vietnam after training in the People’s Republic of China, bringing 36 MiG-17 and MiG-19 fighters to Phúc Yên airfield near Hanoi.

• 1958 – A Lockheed U-2A, 56-6697, Article 364, the fourth airframe of the initial USAF order, delivered January 1957 to USAF at Groom Lake, then to 4080th SRW, Laughlin AFB, Texas, in June: 1957, crashes this date killing trainee Lt. Paul Haughland. Despite Cessna L-27 chase plane to radio instructions, Haughland's U-2 rolled rapidly to starboard at 200 feet during landing approach and struck ground in a near-vertical attitude. Accident report notes that the flight manual did not sufficiently highlight the unusual stall characteristics.

• 1956 – First flight of the Beechcraft Travel Air

• 1956 – Spanish Air Force North American F-86F Sabre, C.5-4 crashes.

• 1957 – F/L WJ Marsh was awarded the George Medal when he rescued the pilot of a crashed North American Sabre at Chatham, NB. Four assisting airmen Cpl Onarheim, LAC Henderson, LAC Gommer and LAC Meier, were awarded the Queen’s Commendation for Brave Conduct.

• 1953 – Ted Williams returns to the Red Sox after serving a tour of duty as a Marine airman in the Korean War.

• 1953 – The first attempted launch of a Northrop B-62 Snark at Cape Canaveral, Florida, fails when, after 15 seconds of flight, the drag chute deploys prematurely and the missile crashes.

• 1953 – Israeli Air Force de Havilland Mosquito FB.6 2113, disappeared in flight over the Mediterranean, Two crew missing.

• 1952 – First flight of the Boulton Paul P.120

• 1952 – A fire breaks out on the hangar deck of the USS Boxer at ~0530 hrs. when a fuel tank of an aircraft catches fire while the ship is conducting combat operations in the Sea of Japan. The blaze is extinguished after a four to five hour fight. The final total of casualties was determined to be: 8 dead, 1 missing, 1 critically injured, 1 seriously burned and some 70 overcome by smoke. Of the 63 who had gone over the side, all were rescued and returned to the ship. Eighteen aircraft, mostly Grumman F9F-2 Panthers, were damaged (by fire and saltwater) or destroyed.

• 1950 – Entered Service: Handley Page Hermes with BOAC

• 1945 – Hiroshima is devastated when an atomic bomb, “Little Boy”, is dropped by the United States B-29 Enola Gay. Around 90,000 people were killed instantly.

• 1945 – B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay drops "Little Boy" the first nuclear weapon used in warfare over the Japanese city of Hiroshima.

• 1945 – All-time highest-scoring American flying ace (40 credited kills) Richard Bong is killed trying to bail out of a Lockheed P-80A Shooting Star jet fighter, 44-85048, after a fuel pump failure during a test flight at Burbank Airport, Burbank, California, USA. News of Bong's death is overshadowed by the dropping of the first nuclear weapon on Hiroshima the same day. The never completed Richard I. Bong Air Force Base in Wisconsin was named for him.

• 1943 – A third German air raid on Palermo is driven off by Allied night fighters with only a few bombs dropped on the harbor.

• 1941 – Two squadrons of United States Navy flying boats are based at Reykjavík, Iceland, to conduct flights as part of the Neutrality Patrol.

• 1941 – After running out of ammunition, Soviet National Air Defense Forces pilot Viktor Talalikhin rams a German Heinkel He 111 bomber over Moscow with his Polikarpov I-16 fighter, destroying both aircraft. Talalikhin parachutes to safety. It is the first aerial night ramming in history.

• 1937 – In response to a request by Spanish Nationalist leader Francisco Franco for the Italian armed forces to attack ships in the Mediterranean Sea bringing aid to the Republicans, Italian aircraft based on Majorca bomb a British, a French, and an Italian merchant ship near Algiers.

• 1936 – German Junkers Ju 52 transports begin a schedule of airlifting 500 Nationalist troops a day from Spanish Morocco to Spain. Nationalist leader Francisco Franco himself makes the flight on August 6.

• 1920 – Stefan Bastyr, Polish aviator, first flight in independent Poland dies (b. 1890).

• 1919 – Captain Harry Butler makes the first flight over Australia’s St. Vincent Gulf, carrying mail between Adelaide and Minlaton.

• 1916 – French ace Capitaine René Fonck gains his first confirmed victory. He will become the highest-scoring Allied and second-highest-scoring ace overall of World War I.

• 1910 – An International aviation meeting opens at Lanark, Scotland, drawing a wide range of flyers and airplanes. In all, 22 competitors participate.

August 7

• 2012 – Egyptian Air Force aircraft strike militants at Sheikh Zuweid on Egypt's Sinai Peninsula (overnight 7-8 Aug.). It is the first Egyptian airstrike in the Sinai Peninsula since the Yom Kippur War in October 1973.[1]

• 2009 – Canadian airline Island Express Air commences operations.

• 1999 – TACV Flight 5002: A TACV Cabo Verde Airlines Dornier Do 228 (charter from the Cape Verde Coast Guard) crashes into a cliff on Santo Antão, Cape Verde during poor weather. All 18 people on board were killed.

• 1997 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-85 at 10:41 am EDT. Mission highlights: CRISTA-SPAS.

• 1990 – Operation Desert Shield begins, as the first American air patrols, troops and equipment land in Saudi Arabia to discourage an Iraqi invasion. Iraq had annexed neighboring Kuwait five days earlier.

• 1989 – U.S. Congressman Mickey Leland (D-TX) and 15 others die in a plane crash in Ethiopia.

• 1982 – Esenboğa International Airport attack was an attack on Esenboğa International Airport in Ankara, Turkey, perpetrated by the “Pierre Gulumian commando” group from the Armenian militant organization ASALA. The bombing killed 9 people and injured some 72.

• 1980 – Janice Brown pilots the MacCready Gossamer Penguin on its first solar powered flight.

• 1980 – Aerolineas Argentinas and Iberia jointly inaugurate the world's longest non-stop air route, between Buenos Aires and Madrid

• 1976 – The Viking 2 probe enters a Martian orbit after an 11 month trip from Earth.

• 1971 – The Apollo 15 spacecraft splashes down in the Pacific, 330 miles north of Hawaii, having been the fourth manned moon mission.

• 1964 – The Turkish Air Force strikes Greek positions on Cyprus (7-9 Aug).

• 1964 – American aircraft begin photographic reconnaissance flights over North Vietnam.

• 1964 – The United States Congress passes the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, authorizing President Lyndon B. Johnson to use conventional military force in Southeast Asia.

• 1963 – First flight of the Lockheed YF-12

• 1959 – The first ever television images of earth from space are transmitted from the Explorer 6 satellite.

• 1951 – William Bridgeman sets a new airspeed record in the Douglas Skyrocket of Mach 1.88 (1,245 mph, 1,992 km/h).

• 1951 – First flight of the McDonnell F3H Demon

• 1949 – Using the probe-and-drogue aerial refueling system, a Royal Air Force Gloster Meteor Mk 3 remains aloft continuously for 12 hours 3 min, with pilot comfort appearing to be the only factor limiting an ability to stay aloft even longer.

• 1945 – 131 B-29s drop 830 tons (752,971 kg) of bombs on the Toyokawa Naval Arsenal in Japan.

• 1945 – First flight of the Nakajima Kikka

• 1943 – First flight of the Ilyushin Il-6

• 1943 – 197 British Lancasters bombers attack Genoa, Milan, and Turin, with the loss of two aircraft (overnight). Over Turin, where 20 people are killed and 79 injured, Group Captain John H. Searby serves as the first successful “Master of Ceremonies”. He's later known as “Master Bomber” – an experienced officer who circles over a bombing target throughout an attack to direct bombing crews by radio and improve their accuracy.

• 1942 – Operation Watchtower, the U.S. invasion of Guadalcanal, Tulagi, Gavutu, and Tanambogo, begins. The aircraft carriers USS Enterprise (CV-6) and USS Saratoga (CV-3) cover the landings with airstrikes, and U.S. Army Air Forces B-17 Flying Fortresses bomb Japanese airfields at Rabaul. Rabaul-based Japanese aircraft attack U.S. transports and their escorts off Guadalcanal, and dogfights with aircraft from Enterprise and Saratoga ensue.

• 1941 – 13 Ilyushin DB-3 bombers of the Soviet Navy’s Baltic Fleet Air Force conduct a raid on Berlin without loss (overnight). It is the first of ten Soviet Naval Aviation raids on Berlin in August and September 941.

• 1941 – Bruno Mussolini, the son of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and commander of the 274a Squadriglia (274th Squadron), was piloting one of the prototypes of the "secret" Piaggio P.108B bomber near the San Giusto Airport in Pisa. He flew too low and crashed into a house.The cockpit section separated from the rest of the aircraft and although the aircraft did not catch fire, it was nevertheless totally destroyed in the impact. Mussolini died of his injuries.

• 1937 – Italian aircraft from Majorca bomb a Greek ship in the Mediterranean Sea.

• 1933 – One of the earliest Korean female aviators, Park Kyung-won, dies a plane crash near Hakone, Japan.

• 1928 – One of the most successful designs of the day, the first Curtiss Model 50 Robin, takes to the air. A typical Robin has a wingspan of 41 ft and a length of 25 ft 8 in with a 185-hp engine.

• 1919 – Capt. Ernest C. Hoy becomes the first pilot to fly over the Canadian Rockies when he carries mail from Vancouver, British Columbia to Calgary, Alberta in a Curtiss JN-4 biplane. Unable to climb above 7,000 feet, he has to fly between mountain peaks, with vicious updrafts and downdrafts pulling at his plane, with only 150 feet between him and the craggy peaks of Crawford Pass. On his return flight, he cartwheels shortly after takeoff and, badly shaken, never flies again.

• 1918 – First flight of the SPAD S.XX

• 1917 – Squadron Commander Edwin H. Dunning, Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS), (17 July 1892 - 7 August 1917) during landing attempt aboard HMS Furious, Pennant number 47, in Sopwith Pup N6452, decides to go around before touchdown, but Le Rhône rotary engine chokes, Pup stalls and falls into the water off the starboard bow. Pilot stunned, drowns in the 20 minutes before rescuers reach still-floating airframe. Dunning had made two previous successful landings on Furious, the first-ever aboard a moving vessel.

• 1917 – The Morane-Saulnier A.I. Parasol fighter airplane makes its first flight in France.

• 1913 – Aviation pioneer Samuel Cody is killed in a crash.

August 8

• 2011 – IrAero Flight 103, an Antonov An-24, overruns the runway after landing at Ignatyevo Airport, Blagoveshchensk; all 36 on board survive with 12 suffering injuries.

• 2009 – Hudson River mid-air collision: N71 MC, a Piper PA-32R, and N401LH, a Eurocopter AS350 collide mid-air over New York. Both aircraft crash into the Hudson River, killing all three people on board the aircraft and all six people on board the helicopter.

• 2007 – Virgin America began operations.

• 2007 – Launch: Space Shuttle Endeavou STS-118 at 22:36:42 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 13A.1: S5 Truss & Spacehab-SM & ESP3. First use of SSPTS (Station-to-Shuttle Power Transfer System).

• 2007 – An RAF Aérospatiale-Westland Puma HC.1, ZA934, 'BZ', of 33 Squadron, crashes in a wooded area of Hudswell Grange, W of Catterick Garrison, North Yorkshire, UK. Two RAF crew, pilot and aircraft commander Flt. Lt. David Oxer Hanson Sale, and crewman Sgt. Phillip Anthony "Taff" Burfoot died in the crash, while Army Pvt. Sean Tait, Royal Regiment of Scotland, died two days later in hospital. Nine others injured but survive.

• 2006 – A UH-60 Black Hawk 86-24535 from 82nd AAC (MEDEVAC) attached to 3rd MAW crashes in Anbar, killing two crew members and injuring four.[1][2]

• 2004 – OH-58D(I) Kiowa 96-0015 made emergency landing north of Baghdad after being hit by RPG. Crew unhurt.[3]

• 2002 – Rico Linhas Aéreas Flight 4823, an Embraer EMB 120 Brasília, crashes on approach in a rainstorm; the aircraft breaks up into three pieces and catches fire; 23 of 31 on board perish.

• 1998 – An Grumman F-14A-95-GR Tomcat, BuNo 160407, 'AC 105', of VF-32, based at NAS Oceana, Virginia Beach, Virginia, crashes into the Atlantic Ocean, while on a routine training mission. Both crewmen eject and are rescued within 15 minutes, Navy officials in Norfolk, Virginia said. The F-14 was operating from the USS Enterprise.

• 1993 – A Saab JAS 39 Gripen, 39-102, crashed on the central Stockholm island of Långholmen, near the Västerbron bridge, during a slow speed manoeuver during a display over the Stockholm Water Festival. Lars Rådeström, the same pilot as in the 1989 incident, ejected safely. Despite large crowds of onlookers, only one person on the ground was injured.3] This crash was, like the previous one, caused by a PIO.

• 1989 – Launch: Space Shuttle Columbia STS-28 at 8:37:00 am EDT. Mission highlights: Fourth classified DoD mission; Satellite Data System deployment.

• 1986 – First flight of the British Aerospace EAP

• 1985 – A USAF General Dynamics F-16A Block 15F Fighting Falcon, 81-0750, of the 421st Tactical Fighter Squadron, crashed during a training mission in northwest Utah, killing the pilot. Crashed onto the Utah Test and Training Range killing pilot, First Lieutenant S. Brad Peale. The aircraft suffered a controlled flight into terrain (CFIT).

• 1985 – A USAF LTV A-7D Corsair II, 69‑6198, of the 4450th Tactical Group, lost power, caught fire and crashed into Midwest City, a suburb of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, pilot Maj. Dennis D. Nielson staying with aircraft as he attempted to steer it towards less-populous area before ejecting, but fighter impacted house, killing one, injuring one, one missing, said a United Press International report. Second victim found on 9 August. This unit was secretly operating Lockheed F-117 Nighthawks at this time.

• 1982 – First flight of the Cessna 208 Caravan

• 1967 – First flight of the Boeing 737-200

• 1957 – Mikoyan-Gurevich Ye-50, a swept-wing, experimental high-altitude interceptor, the Ye-2 airframe modified to fit Dushkin S-155 rocket motor, with design work started in 1954, first flight in 1956. Programme terminated after crash of Ye-50/3 on this date. Test pilot N. A. Korovin, of GK NII VVS, is killed when the engine explodes, escape system fails.

• 1955 – Internal explosion aboard Bell X-1A, 48-1384, while being carried aloft by Boeing B-29 mothership, forces NACA pilot Joseph Albert Walker to exit aircraft back into the Superfortress, which is then jettisoned due to the full fuel load it carries, the rocket-powered testcraft coming down on the Edwards AFB, California bombing range.

• 1948 – FW ‘Casey’ Baldwin, the first Canadian to pilot an heavier-than-air flying machine, died at Neareagh, Nova Scotia.

• 1948: Birth: Svetlana Savitskaya, cosmonaut

• 1946 – First flight of the Convair B-36

• 1945 – 245 B-29 s drop 1,296 tons (1,175,723 kg) of bombs on Yawata, Japan.

• 1944 – First flight of the Junkers Ju 287 was on 16 Aug 1944.

• 1943 – Axis bombers attack the American light cruiser USS Philadelphia (CL-41) off Sant’Agata di Militello, Sicily, scoring no hits.

• 1943 – (8-17) Allied aircraft of the Northwest African Air Force attack Axis forces evacuating Sicily across the Strait of Messina to mainland Italy in Operation Lehrgang. Wellington strategic bombers average 85 sorties nightly – Attacking evacuation beaches in Sicily until the night of August 13-14, then ports in mainland Italy – And medium bombers and fighter-bombers fly 1,170 sorties. Allied planes face no Axis air opposition but face heavy antiaircraft fire and succeed in sinking only a few vessels, never endangering the success of the Axis evacuation.

• 1942 – U. S. Marines capture the partially completed Japanese airstrip on Guadalcanal. They will rename it Henderson Field, and it will be the focal point of the six-month Guadalcanal campaign. Offshore, Rabaul-based Japanese aircraft damage a U. S. transport, which becomes a total loss.

• 1942 – 1st Lt. Edward Joseph Peterson dies in hospital from injuries suffered in the crash this date of Lockheed F-4 Lightning, 41-2202, a reconnaissance variant of the P-38, when it suffers engine failure on take-off from Air Support Command Base, near Colorado Springs, Colorado. Field is renamed Peterson Army Air Field on 3 March 1943, later Peterson Air Force Base on 1 March 1976.

• 1942 – The sole Republic XP-47B Thunderbolt, 40-3051, operating out of the Republic plant at Farmingdale, New York, is lost when the pilot interrupted wheel retraction, leaving the tailwheel in the superchargers' exhaust gases. This set the tire alight which ignited the magnesium hub. When the burning unit retracted into the fuselage, it severed the tail unit control rods, forcing the pilot, Fillmore "Fil" Gilmer, a former naval aviator, to bail out with the airframe crashing in the waters of Long Island Sound. Loss of prototype went unpublicized at this early stage of the war. Nothing is ever found of the wreckage.

• 1935 – First flight of the Morane-Saulnier M.S.406

• 1934 – 8-9 – James Ayling and Leonard Reid make the first non-stop flight from Canada to England, in a de Havilland DH.84, taking 30 hours 50 min for the flight.

• 1930 – End of the Challenge 1930 contest, won by Fritz Morzik..

• 1929 – The Graf Zeppelin (LZ 127) begins its circumnavigation of the globe at Lakehurst, New Jersey.

• 1924 – The U. S. Navy dirigible USS Shenandoah (ZR-1) docks with the airship tender USS Patoka (AO-9) while the latter is underway, showing that airships could operate from support ships far out to sea.

• 1914 – A French aerial observer is injured by small-arms fire, becoming that nation's first casualty of air war.

• 1910 – The first aircraft tricycle landing gear is installed on the US Army’s Wright airplane.

• 1908 – Wilbur Wright makes his first flights at the Hunaudières racetrack at Le Mans, France. The Wright Flyer used for this and later flights had been shipped to Le Havre by Orville the previous year. It had been seriously damaged by custom officials when it arrived in France and uncrated. Wilbur spent the whole summer of 1908 rebuilding the machine and getting it into flying condition. Wilbur’s flights in this machine will have a profound effect on European aviation during the following months.

• 1901 – Wilbur Wright achieves a flight of 389 feet (118.5 m) at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, in the Wright 1901 glider.

• 1709 – First person in flight: Bartolomeu de Gusmão in a balloon filled with heated air at the hall of the Casa da India in Lisbon. (However, this claim is not generally recognized by aviation historians outside the Portuguese speaking community, in particular the FAI.)

August 9

• 2011 – In the 2011 Avis Amur Antonov An-12 crash, an Antonov An-12 crashes at Omsukchan, Russia due to an engine fire, killing all 11 on board.

• 2011 – The Government of the United Arab Emirates turns a Libyan Air Force Ilyushin Il-76TD it had seized at Dubai over to the Libyan provisional National Transitional Council at Benghazi, Libya. It becomes the Free Libyan Air Force's first military transport aircraft.[1]

• 2010 – JetBlue flight attendant incident was an altercation that occurred after JetBlue Airways Flight 1052, a flight from Pittsburgh to New York City, had landed. The incident garnered significant media attention when, upon landing, Steven Slater, a flight attendant, announced over the plane’s public address system that he had been called an obscenity by a passenger, quit his job, deployed the evacuation slide at the terminal gate, and slid down it. Slater claimed to have been injured by a passenger when he instructed her to sit down. Slater’s account of the event was not corroborated by others.

• 2007 – Air Moorea Flight 1121, operated on an Air Moorea de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter airplane, crashed shortly after taking off from Temae Airport on Moorea island in French Polynesia; the plane was bound for Tahiti. According to the official report by Bureau d’Enquêtes et d’Analyses pour la sécurité de l’Aviation Civile, all 20 occupants, including 19 passengers and one crew member, died.

• 2006 – First flight of the BAE Skylynx II UAV

• 2006 – Transatlantic aircraft plot was a terrorist plot to detonate liquid explosives carried on board at least 10 airliners travelling from the United Kingdom to the United States and Canada. The plot was discovered and foiled by British police before it could be carried out and, as a result, unprecedented security measures were immediately put in place.

• 1996 – Sir Frank Whittle, inventor of the jet engine, dies at 89.

• 1995 – Aviateca Flight 901, a Boeing 737, crashes into San Vicente volcano while on approach to Cuscatlán International Airport; all 65 on board die.

• 1980 – Jacqueline Cochrane, US pilot / first female to fly faster than sound, dies at 70.

• 1976 – USSR launches Luna 24, last Lunar flight to date from Earth.

• 1976 – First flight of the Boeing YC-14

• 1976 – Sikorsky YUH-60A UTTAS, 73-21650, first prototype to fly, fully loaded with 14 Army personnel during testing, makes emergency landing at 2315 hrs. in a wooded area of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, due to vibration caused by outer skin of a main rotor blade coming loose. Due to heavy mist, pilot CW2 Charlie Lovell believes he is landing in a cornfield but instead comes down in a pine forest. Main rotor scythes down 40 pines, some as large as five inches in diameter, as it lands, but main rotor blades do not shatter. Only injury is to a soldier who bumps his head against a truncated pine as he egresses the helicopter. After cutting down stumps around the aircraft, and replacing the main and tail rotors, the now-nicknamed "Phoenix" is flown out of the site three days later. US Army, duly impressed by the crash survivability shown, will award the UTTAS contract to Sikorsky and the design will be named the Blackhawk. This airframe will be destroyed in a crash on 19 May 1978.

• 1975 – Japan Air Lines establishes Japan Asia Airways as a subsidiary

• 1974 – A Buffalo of 116 ATU was shot down by a Syrian Missile while on a routine flight between Beirut and Damascus. The flight was commanded by Capt. Gary Foster of Comox. Nine Canadians lost their lives.

• 1974 – RAF McDonnell Douglas/Hawker Siddeley F-4M Phantom FGR.2, XV493, 'F', of No. 41 Squadron was involved in fatal mid-air collision with a Piper Pawnee crop-sprayer, G-ASVK, over Fordham Fen near Downham Market, Norfolk, England. Two Phantom and one Pawnee crew all KWF.

• 1970 – LANSA Flight 502, a Lockheed L-188 Electra turboprop, crashes and burns shortly after takeoff from Cuzco, Peru, killing 99 people on the plane and two on the ground; among the dead are 49 U.S. high school exchange students.

• 1967 – The world’s first radar-equipped antsubmarine helicopter enters service, a Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm Westland Wessex HAS.3 with No. 814 Squadron.

• 1961 – The Holtaheia Accident: An Eagle Airways Vickers VC.1 Viking crashes at Holta, Strand, Norway, killing all 39 on board, including 36 people from the Archbishop Lanfranc School.

• 1958 – A 1958 Central African Airways plane crash occurred near Benina International Airport due to pilot error, killing 36 of 54 on board.

• 1956 – First flight of the Fiat G.91

• 1952 – Lt Peter Carmichael of No. 802 Squadron FAA aboard HMS Ocean claims the Fleet Air Arm's first MiG-15 kill, from a Hawker Sea Fury.

• 1950 – The first Canadian built Sabre Mark 1 flew.

• 1950 – Al Lily became the first Canadian to break the Sound Barrier.

• 1949 – US Navy pilot Lt. J. L. "Pappy" Fruin of VF-101 loses control of his McDonnell F2H-1 Banshee at 500 mph and 30,000 feet and ejects over Walterboro, South Carolina, becoming the first American Naval aviator to use an ejector seat during an actual in-flight emergency. VF-101 was the first Navy unit to receive the type.

• 1949 – The first Canadian passenger jet (second in the world after the British), the Avro Canada Jetliner, is flown at Malton. Despite its advanced design, it never saw production and was later sold for scrap.

• 1945 – Carrier aircraft of Task Force 38 conduct devastating strikes against Japanese airfields in northern Honshu where the Japanese had been marshalling aircraft for a planned major suicide strike on B-29 bases in the Mariana Islands. The Americans claim 251 Japanese aircraft destroyed and 141 damaged.

• 1945 – B-29 Bockscar drops a plutonium-239 nuclear weapon, Fat Man, on Nagasaki

• 1942 – The P-38 Lightning fighter scores its first aerial victories when two P-38 s of the 343rd Fighter Group flown by U. S. Army Air Forces Lieutenants K. Ambrose and S. A. Long shoot down two Japanese Kawanishi H6 K4 flying boats near the Aleutian Islands.

• 1941 – Flying a Dornier Do 215 B-5 night fighter, Luftwaffe Oberleutnant Ludwig Becker achieves Germany’s first aerial victory employing airborne radar, using a Lichtenstein radar to detect and close with a British Vickers Wellington bomber participating in a raid on Hamburg, Germany, before shooting down the Wellington.

• 1936 – Six aircraft support a Republican seizure of Ibiza.

• 1918 – Eight Italian Ansaldo SVA biplanes of the 87 Squadriglia “Serenimissa”, led by Gabriele D’Annunzio, fly over Vienna for 30 min taking photographs and dropping leaflets before returning to base without loss.

• 1896 – Otto Lilienthal crashes during a routine flight in the hills of Stölln and dies next day because of a spinal injury.

• 1884 – The first fully controllable free-flight is made in a French Army dirigible La France by Charles Renard and Arthur Krebs. The electric-powered flight covers 8 km (5 miles) in 23 min. It was the first full circle flight with landing on the starting point.

August 10

• 2010 – Alaska Turbo Otter crash: A de Havilland Canada DHC-3 T Turbo Otter crashes near Aleknagik, United States killing former Senator Ted Stevens. Former NASA Administrator and current EADS North America CEO Sean O’Keefe is amongst the survivors.

• 2007 – A US Navy HH-60 "Rescue Hawk" make a forced landing in Yusufiyah. The two crew members sustained non-life threatening injuries.[1]

• 2006 – British authorities announce that a plot to simultaneously denonate bombs smuggled in hand luggage aboard ten airliners bound for the United States over the Atlantic Ocean has been foiled. Tightened security measures in the United Kingdom and United States and flight cancellations which happen afterwards cause severe chaos at several London airports.

• 2005 – Copterline Flight 103, a Sikorsky S-76 helicopter crashes off Tallinn, Estonia, killing all 14 on board.

• 2002 – US Airways files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

• 2001 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-105 at 21:10:14 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS supply, crew rotation.
• 1999 – A Pakistan Navy Breguet Atlantic, believed to be serialled '91', c/n 33, of 29 Squadron, is shot down by two Indian Air Force MiG-21 jets, citing airspace violation. Dubbed the Atlantique incident, it raises tensions between India and Pakistan.

• 1993 – An McDonnell-Douglas AV-8B-8 Harrier II, BuNo 162955, c/n 512083/77, of VMA-231, crashed on the runway at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, North Carolina as the pilot was doing "touch and go" landings. The plane's flaps jammed when moisture got into the flap controller causing it to short out. The pilot, Captain William P. Delaney ejected before the plane hit the runway however his parachute descended into the fireball killing him.

• 1990 – Prime Minister Mulroney announced that Navy ships, HMCS Athabaskan, HMCS Terra Nova, and HMCS Protecteur accompanied by five Sea King helicopters from 423 Squadron, would deploy to the Persian Gulf.

• 1965 – A fire in a Martin LGM-25C Titan II missile silo at Searcy, Arkansas kills 53 men, all of them civilians, in the worst accident in "U.S. space age defense" when a diesel generator catches fire, smothering the victims. The missile, fully loaded with liquid fuel, did not burn. Its nuclear warhead had been removed while the civilian workmen updated the physical plant of the complex. Two civilians were able to flee the fire area through an underground tunnel to the access rooms and launch center. "The fire probably burned less than an hour", said Capt. Douglas Wood, Public Information Officer for Little Rock Air Force Base, which commands the 18 Titan II silos ringing Central Arkansas, "but up to 12 hours later smoke was still billowing in the silo."

• 1965 – A Virginia Air Guard Cessna L-19 Bird Dog crashes at Camp Pickett, Virginia, while flying a support mission for forces in summer field training, killing the crew. Pilot Capt. Laurence A. White and S/Sgt. Melvin D. Mangum, both of the Richmond Howitzers, are KWF when the liaison aircraft comes down near the Nottoway River reservoir.

• 1962 – First flight of the Bell 533

• 1959 – A Royal Canadian Air Force Canadair F-86 Sabre of the Golden Hawks aerobatic team overshot when landing at McCall Airfield, Alberta, with the rest of the team and collided with a Piper Pacer about 2 miles (3.2 km) W of the field. Pilot of the Sabre and two occupants of the Pacer were killed.

• 1955 – Two United States Air Force Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar transports of the 10th Troop Carrier Squadron, 60th Troop Carrier Group, collide over Edelweiler, Germany, near Stuttgart, shortly after takeoff for training mission from Stuttgart Army Airfield near Echterdingen. C-119G, 53-3222, c/n 11238, piloted by Robert T. Asher, and C-119G, 53-7841, c/n 11258, piloted by Eugene L. Pesci, both crash. In all, 66 died, 44 on one Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar, and 22 on the other. Troops aboard were of the Army's 499th Engineering Battalion.

• 1949 – First flight of the Avro Canada C102 Jetliner

• 1947 – A new world airspeed record of 640 mph (1,031 km/h) is set in the Douglas Skystreak during a flight on 20 August 1947.

• 1947 – British European Airways began the world's first regular cargo-only airline service.

• 1945 – Task Force 38 aircraft again strike northern Honshu heavily, striking two previously undetected Japanese airfields.

• 1945 – After suffering heavy damage during the airstrikes of July 24, 28, and 29, the Japanese aircraft carrier Kaiyo is abandoned in Beppu Bay when she lists far enough for the port side of her flight deck to be underwater. She later will be scrapped in place.

• 1944 – Saipan-based U. S. Army Air Forces B-24 Liberators of the Seventh Air Force conduct the first bombing raid against Iwo Jima, the first of 10 air raids on Iwo Jima during August.

• 1944 – U. S. Army Air Forces B-29 Superfortresses carry out raids against Palembang on Sumatra and Nagasaki, Japan. The Palembang raid is the longest carried out by the 20th Air Force during World War II, requiring a round trip of 4,030 miles (6,490 km) between a staging base on Ceylon and the target. The Nagasaki raid employs the heaviest B-29 bomb loads to date—6,000 lbs (2,722 kg) per bomber—and results in the 20th Air Force’s first air-to-air kill, a Japanese fighter shot down by B-29 gunner Technical Sergeant H. C. Edwards.

• 1943 – Reinforced by 250 Imperial Japanese Army aircraft from Rabaul, Japanese air forces in New Guinea are ordered to conduct an air offensive against Allied airfields on New Guinea and Allied convoys along the Papuan coast.

• 1938 – 10-11 – A Lufthansa Focke-Wulf Fw 200 makes a non-stop flight from Berlin to New York, via Hamburg, Glasgow, Newfoundland, and Halifax, taking 24 hours 36 min for the trip.

• 1936 – A Nationalist ground column under Colonel Juan Yagüe y Blanco captures Mérida, Spain, after advancing 200 miles (322 km) in less than a week. Nine German Junkers Ju 52 s and eight Italian Savoia-Marchetti SM.81 s have given the column local air superiority, while a civilian aeroclub from Seville has provided aerial reconnaissance and in one instance forced Republican militiamen to abandon their positions by dropping melons on them.

• 1922 – The Schneider Trophy race is flown at Naples, Italy. It is won by the only non-Italian competitor, H. C. Biard in a British Supermarine Sea Lion II, with a winning speed of 234.5 km/h (145.7 mph).

• 1921 – The United States Department of the Navy establishes the Bureau of Aeronautics to oversee all matters relating to naval aircraft, personnel, and operations. United States Marine Corps aviation remains under a separate command, the Director of Aviation at Headquarters Marine Corps.

• 1918 – Lt. Erich Loewenhardt, third-highest-scoring German ace of the Great War, is KWF when the wheels of a Fokker D.VII flown by Lt. Alfred Wentz of Jasta 11 (also spelt Wenz in some sources) collide with the wing of his own Fokker D.VII, causing it to crash. He bails out but his chute fails to open. Lowenhardt, posted to JG.1, and flying with Jasta 10 from July 1917, scored 53 victories before his death. Wentz successfully bails out of his stricken fighter.

• 1912 – Englishman Francis K. McClean becomes the first pilot to fly under bridges spanning the Thames River when he takes off from Harty Ferry, Eastchurch in his Short biplane S. 33.

• 1910 – Claude Grahame-White attempts to fly the first airmail in the world to be carried on a powered airplane when he takes off from Squires Gate near Blackpool, England heading for Southport. The attempt in his little Blériot monoplane fails and he is forced to land.

• 1840 – American Louis Lauriat, whose balloon flies at 21 mph in New Brunswick, makes the first manned balloon flight in Canada.

August 11

• 2009 – Airlines PNG Flight 4684, a de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter carrying 11 passengers and 2 crew crashes into a mountain at Isurava, Papua New Guinea whilst attempting a go around at Kokoda Airport, Papua New Guinea; all passengers and crew perished in the accident.

• 2004 –CH-53E Super Stallion 164782 from HMM-166 (Reinforced) crashes in the Al-Anbar province, killing two Marines and wounding three others.

• 2003, The Spirit of Butts Farm becomes the first flight across the Atlantic by a computer-controlled model aircraft.

• 2002 – U. S. Airways filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

• 2001 – First flight of the Hawker 4000

• 1995 – First flight of the Embraer ERJ-145

• 1993 – 11-14 – Two B-1 Lancers complete a round-the-world trip in 47 hours.

• 1991 – Space Shuttle Atlantis lands after completing mission STS-43.

• 1986 – A modified Westland Lynx sets a new helicopter world speed record of 249 mph (401 km/h)

• 1985 – Space Shuttle Challenger is flown to Kennedy Space Center via Davis-Monthan AFB, Ariz.

• 1984 – President Ronald Reagan jokes during a radio sound check that he had “signed legislation that would outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in 5 min. ” The joke is not broadcast live (contrary to some accounts) but when word of it spreads, the Soviet Army is put on high alert for about 30 min.

• 1982 – A bomb explodes in a seat cushion aboard Pan Am Flight 830, killing 16-year-old Toru Ozawa and injuring 15 others. The plane, a 747-100 (Clipper Ocean Rover, N754 PA), makes an emergency landing in Honolulu and is repaired. The perpetrator, Mohammed Rashed, is arrested in Greece seven years later and convicted of murder, but freed eight years later. Rashed has also been indicted in the US, and is currently on the FBI’s most wanted list.

• 1979 – The 1979 Dniprodzerzhynsk mid-air collision between two Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-134s kills 178.

• 1972 – NATO signs a development contract for the MRCA (Multi-Role Combat Aircraft) programme, which will eventually result in the Panavia Tornado

• 1972 – First flight of the Northrop F-5E

• 1967 – F-105 Thunderchiefs of the 355th Tactical Fighter Wing USAF cut the Paul Doumer bridge, using 100 tons of bombs.

• 1962 – The Soviet Union launched cosmonaut Andrian Nikolayev on a 94-hour flight.

• 1956 – First flight of the 4-motor Cessna 620.

• 1955 – First flight of the Bell XV-3 (Bell 200), American tilt rotor aircraft (the three-bladed rotors replaced by two-bladed rotors)

• 1955 – Two United States Air Force C-119 Flying Boxcars collide near Stuttgart, Germany, killing 66.

• 1952 – British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) inaugurates its new weekly service between London and Colombo, the capital of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka).

• 1945 – First of only two Nakajima Kikka twin-jet fighters, completed on 25 June, first flown 7 August for eleven minutes by Lt. Cdr. Sasumu Tanaoka out of Kisarazu Naval Air Base, crashes on second flight this date. Second unflown Kikka is shipped to the U.S. after the Japanese capitulation.

• 1943 – Eight German Focke Wulf Fw 190 s attack USS Philadelphia and two American destroyers off Brolo, Sicily; they score no hits. Philadelphia shoots down five of them and destroyer USS Ludlow (DD-438) and a U. S. Army Air Forces fighter shoot down one each. Allied aircraft break up a German counterattack against U. S. Army forces at Brolo, but seven U. S. Army Air Forces A-36 bombers mistakenly attack the American positions, destroying the command post and four artillery pieces.

• 1943 – Nine U. S. Army Air Forces B-24 Liberators of the Eleventh Air Force make the second raid of World War II against the Kurile Islands, again attacking the Japanese base at Paramushiro, causing noteworthy damage. Japanese fighters shoot down one B-24 and damage the other eight; the B-24 s shoot down 13 Japanese fighters. The Eleventh Air Force decides not to raid the Kuriles again without fighter escort of its bombers.

• 1942 – Axis opposition to Operation Pedestal – An Allied resupply convoy to Malta escorted by the British aircraft carriers HMS Victorious, HMS Indomitable, and HMS Eagle, against which 1,000 Axis aircraft have gathered in Sicily and Sardinia – begins when the German submarine U-73 hits Eagle with four torpedoes in the Mediterranean Sea about 141 kilometres (88 mi) north of Algiers. Eagle sinks in eight minutes, with the loss of 131 of her crew and 16 Sea Hurricane fighters. German torpedo planes launch ineffectuve attacks on the convoys, and a strike by Royal Air Force Beaufighters destroys five and damages 14 of the German aircraft on the ground after they return to base

• 1941 – (11-12) The Soviet Air Force makes its first raid on Berlin, as 11 Petlyakov Pe-8 s arrack the city. German defenses shoot down five Pe-8 s, and Soviet antiaircraft artillery mistakenly shoots down another as it returns to base.

• 1939 – Pan American World Airways begins scheduled flights from New York, New York to Southampton, England.

• 1937 – First flight of the Boulton Paul Defiant

• 1926 – Second Lieutenant Eugene Hoy Barksdale is killed when the Douglas O-2 observation plane, 25-350, McCook Field project number P-441, he was testing went into an uncontrollable spin over McCook Field, Dayton, Ohio. His parachute snagged on the wingstruts, preventing escape from the aircraft. Barksdale Field, later Barksdale Air Force Base, is named for him upon establishment at the Military Reservation, Bossier Parish, Louisiana on 2 February 1933.

• 1921 – The 1921 Schneider Trophy race is flown at Venice, Italy. In an all-Italian field, Giovanni De Briganti wins the race in a Macchi M.7 with an average speed of 189.7 kilometres per hour (117.9 mph).

• 1918 – Royal Air Force Flight Sub-Lieutenant Stuart Culley shoots down Zeppelin L 53 after taking off from a barge towed behind the destroyer HMS Redoubt.

• 1918 – The first use of a parachute from a combat aircraft occurs when a German pilot escapes his burning Pfalz D.III after being attacked by a pilot from No. 19 Squadron RAF.

• 1915 – The U. S. Naval Observatory asks Eastman Kodak to develop a special aerial reconnaissance camera that could be used from an airplane flying at heights of 3,000 feet (910 m) to 6,000 feet (1,800 m).

• 1909 – The first flight of the Baddeck No. 1, a Canadian-built aircraft, by the Canadian Aeroplane Company, took place at Petawawa, Ontario.

• 1906 – Mrs. C. J. S. Miller becomes the first woman passenger in an airship. The 40-hp craft is owned and operated by her husband, Major Miller.

August 12

• 2012 – The airline Wind Jet ceases operations after Alitalia's attempt to purchase it fails, leaving hundred of passengers stranded in Italy.[1]

• 2011 – A NATO airstrike against Libyan government positions in Brega destroys two armored vehicles and kills six Libyan Army soldiers.[2]

• 2011 – The French Navy aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle returns to Toulon, France, after more than four months of continuous operations off the coast of Libya.[3]

• 2005 – An AH-64A Apache 90-0442 from C Company, 8–229th Aviation Regiment crashes near Kirkuk, injuring both crewmembers. Helicopter is written off.[4]

• 1985 – Japan Airlines Flight 123, a Boeing 747, crashes into Mount Osutaka after catastrophic failure of the tailplane severs all hydraulic lines and renders the aircraft uncontrollable. 520 of 524 people on board are killed. To date, it is the worst single-aircraft disaster in history.

• 1979 12-17 – Ben Abruzzo and crew make the first transatlantic crossing by balloon, taking 5 days 17 hours to travel from Presque Island, Maine USA to Évreux, France in the Double Eagle II

• 1978 – First flight of the Pilatus PC-7

• 1978 – Avro Vulcan B.2 XL390 of 617 Squadron Royal Air Force crashed during an air display at Naval Air Station Glenview, Illinois, United States, after apparent stall during a wing-over, coming down in landfill just N of Willow Road. All four crew members killed.

• 1976 – First flight of the Aermacchi MB-339

• 1970 – China Airlines Flight 206, a NAMC YS-11, crashes in thick fog and a severe thunderstorm into Yuan Mountain, near Taipei International Airport, killing 14 of 31 people on board.

• 1966 – First flight of the Learjet 25

• 1965 – First flight of the Fuji FA-200 Aero Subaru

• 1965 – The United States authorizes Operation Iron Hand air missions in Vietnam to detect and suppress enemy surface-to-air-missile sites. The early Iron Hand strikes result in many losses to the attacking American aircraft.

• 1964 – While involved in Soviet Air Force testing, Kamov Ka-22, OI-03, was destroyed. The aircraft entered an uncontrolled turn to the right, and in efforts to correct the Ka-22 pitched into a steep dive. The order was given to abandon the aircraft, and three of the crew survived, but Col S. G. Brovtsev, who was flying, and technician A. F. Rogov, were killed.

• 1962 – One day after launching Andrian Nikolayev into orbit, the Soviet Union also sent up cosmonaut Pavel Popovich; both men landed safely Aug. 15.

• 1960 – The first balloon satellite _ the Echo I _ was launched by the United States from Cape Canaveral.

• 1960 – RAF Vickers Valiant BK.1 XD864 crashed at RAF Spanhoe 3 minutes after takeoff from RAF Wittering, Cambs. Five crew killed.

• 1953 – A US Navy Grumman AF-2 Guardian, 'SL', from Anti-submarine Squadron VS-22 crashes into the ocean immediately after launch from the escort carrier USS Block Island (CVE-106). The pilot, Ensign E.H. Barry, is recovered by a Piasecki HUP plane-guard helicopter.

• 1952 – 1952 Transportes Aéreos Nacional Douglas C-47 mid-air explosion: A Douglas C-47 A explodes in mid-air on a domestic flight in Brazil; all 24 on board die.

• 1950 – F-51 Mustang aircraft are forced to abandon the airfield at Pohang, Korea, due to North Korean People’s Army attacks against it. They return to Japan.

• 1949 – Third of three Saunders-Roe SR.A/1 jet-powered flying-boat fighter prototypes, TG271, design specification E.6/44, is written off after hitting a submerged obstruction and sinking in the Solent off Cowes, Isle of Wight, Royal Navy pilot Lt. Cdr. Eric "Winkle" Brown surviving. Design not placed in production.

• 1947 – In the BSAA Star Dust accident, a British South American Airways Avro 691 Lancastrian Mk.III named Star Dust disappears over the Andes after transmitting an enigmatic coded message ("STENDEC"); the fate of the plane remained a mystery until the crash site was located in 2000; five crew members and six passengers are killed. (This incident occurred 2 August 1947.)

• 1946 – President Harry Truman signs a bill authorizing an appropriation of $50,000 to establish a National Air Museum in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D. C. The small museum eventually becomes the National Air and Space Museum – The most visited museum in the world.

• 1944 – Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., eldest son of Joseph and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, was killed with his co-pilot when their explosives-laden Navy plane blew up over England.

• 1944 – At 8.00 am on 12 August 1944 a Consolidated B-24 Liberator bomber belonging to the United States Army Air Forces 392nd Bombardment Group (Heavy) from RAF Wendling crashed next to Maxwells Farm (51°41′54″N 0°03′06″W), near Cheshunt killing all ten crew The B198 which runs near the crash site has been renamed Lieutenant Ellis Way after the pilot had managed to avoid crashing into the nearby town, one of the firemen who attended the scene has recently secured funding for a permanent crash memorial at the scene.

• 1942 – The first American aircraft – A U. S. Navy PBY Catalina amphibian – Lands on Guadalcanal’s Henderson Field. Aircraft based there will become known as the “Cactus Air Force. ”

• 1942 – German and Italian aircraft attack the Pedestal convoy in the Mediterranean, damaging HMS Indomitable, sinking a destroyer and a merchant cargo ship, and possibly inflicting fatal damage on two other cargo ships. Italian aircraft employ three new weapons for the first time: the motobomba torpedo, a new bomb dropped by Re. 2001 fighters designed to cause maximum damage on aircraft carrier flight decks, and an explosive-laden unmanned Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 bomber controlled as a guided missile by a CANT floatplane. The motobombas strike no targets, one of the flight-deck bombs is dropped onto the deck of HMS Victorious but breaks up and fails to explode, and the SM.79 drone goes out of control and flies inland to crash in Algeria.

• 1941 – Two Wellingtons of No. 115 Sqn carried out the first operational trial of Bomber Commands new navigational device Gee. The trials were a complete success, and the equipment ordered into full production.

• 1941 – No. 414 (Army Co-Operation) was formed in England

• 1940 – (12-23) The German Air Force (Luftwaffe) conducts Operation Eagle Attack (Adlerangriff), targeting British radar stations, inland Fighter Command airfields, and Royal Air Force communication centers during the Battle of Britain.

• 1937 – Majorca-based Italian aircraft sink a Danish cargo vessel in the Mediterranean Sea.

• 1935 – First flight of the de Havilland Dragonfly

• 1927 – The Royal Air Force holds a fly-off between four competing flying boat designs, the Supermarine Southampton, Blackburn Iris, Short Singapore, and Saunders-Roe Valkyrie.

• 1920 – Lt. William Calvin Maxwell, 28, of the 3d Aero Squadron, Camp Stotsenberg in Luzon, Philippines, a native of Atmore, Alabama, is killed in an aviation crash in the Philippines. While on a flight from Camp Stotsenberg to Manila, engine trouble forced Lt. Maxwell to attempt to land his DH-4 in a sugarcane field. Maneuvering to avoid a group of children playing below, he struck a flagpole hidden by the tall sugarcane and was killed instantly. On the recommendation of his former commanding officer, Maj. Roy C. Brown, Montgomery Air Intermediate Depot, Montgomery, Alabama, was renamed Maxwell Field on 8 November 1922.

• 1915 – Flt Cdr Charles Edmonds becomes the first pilot to attack a ship with an air-launched torpedo. He is flying a Short Type 184 from HMS Ben-my-Chree. His target is a Turkish supply ship.

• 1914 – Sole Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.4, 628, crash lands at 1145 hrs. while being flown by Lt. Norman Spratt when one of the wheels collapsed, airframe overturning, sustaining such extensive damage that it is abandoned.

• 1914 – Lieutenant Robin R. Skene and mechanic R. Barlow crash their Blériot monoplane on the way to Dover, becoming the first members of the Royal Flying Corps to die on active duty.

• 1913 – First flight of the Bristol T.B.8

• 1908 – Controlled by Thomas Baldwin and Glenn Curtiss, the Signal Corps’ Dirigible Balloon No.1, known as SC-I, the first Army dirigible, begins flight trials at Fort Myer near Washington, D. C.

• 1888 – The first gas-powered aircraft flies. Built by the German experimenter, Wolfert, the powered airship (dirigible) fitted with a 2 hp Daimler benzene engine running two propellers, flies for 2 ½ miles from Seelberg to Kornwestheim, Germany.

August 13

• 2012 – An Internet video is released showing the crash of what appears to be a Syrian Air Force MiG-23 (NATO reporting name "Flogger") aircraft flying over Muhasan, Syria. Syrian rebels claim to have shot it down.[1]

• 2010 – AIRES Flight 8250, operated by Boeing 737-73 V HK-4682, crashes short of the runway at Gustavo Rojas Pinilla International Airport, San Andrés, Colombia and breaks into three sections. One passenger dies from a heart attack following the accident. The other 124 passengers and six crew survive.

• 2010 – Regional Spanish airline Andalus Lineas Aereas ceases operations.

• 2004 – Air Tahoma Flight 185, a Convair 580, crashes near Covington, Kentucky while descending to land, killing the First Officer.

• 2002 – Midway Airlines (1993–2003) files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

• 1989 – Alice Springs hot air balloon crash: Two hot air balloons collided near Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Australia, causing one to crash to the ground, killing thirteen people.

• 1981 – The G-ASWI North Sea ditching of a Bristow Helicopters Westland Wessex due to engine failure kills all 13 on board.

• 1976 – The Bell Model 222, the first twin-engined light commercial helicopter, developed in the United States, makes its first flight, powered by the 650 SHP Avco Lycoming LTS 101-650 C.

• 1973 – Aviaco Flight 118, a Sud Caravelle, en route from Madrid to A Coruña crashes while approaching A Coruña Alvedro airport, in Montrove, 2 km from the airport; all 85 on board died, and 1 on the ground.

• 1968 – Swedish Count Gustav von Rosen defies Nigerian air defences to fly in supplies to the Biafran rebels

• 1962 – First flight of the British Aerospace 125

• 1951 – A Boeing B-50D-110-BO Superfortress, 49-0268, on test flight out of Boeing Field, Seattle, Washington after modifications, suffers problems immediately after take off, fails to gain altitude, comes down two miles (3 km) N of field, clipping roof of a brewery with the starboard wing, cartwheels into wooden Lester Apartments, wreckage and structure burns for hours. Six on bomber (three Air Force crew, three Boeing employees) and five on ground die.

• 1945 – Carrier aircraft of Task Force 38 strike the Tokyo area, claiming 272 Japanese aircraft destroyed and 149 damaged.

• 1945 – (Overnight) Seven B-29 Superfortresses drop five million leaflets over Tokyo, providing the Japanese population for the first time with the news that Japan had accepted the Potsdam Declaration and was negotiating for peace.

• 1944 – Focke-Wulf Fw 190C V30 prototype, Werke Nummer 0055, modified to Fw 190 V30/U1 as prototype for Ta 152H-0, rebuilt with Fw 190D 1,750 hp (1,300 kW) Jumo 213A-1 power egg, but without new wingtanks, crashes this date on flight out of Langenhagen after only one week of testing. First flown in new guise on 6 August

• 1943 – The USAAF makes its first bombing raid on Austria

• 1942 – Attacking the Pedestal convoy, Axis aircraft sink two more cargo ships and inflict additional damage on a tanker.

• 1940 – A Royal Australian Air Force Lockheed Hudson crashes near Canberra, Australia, killing all 10 people on board. Among the dead are Geoffrey Street, Australian Minister of Defence and Repatriation; James Fairbairn, Australian Minister for Air and Civil Aviation; Sir Henry Gullett, Australian Vice-President of the Executive Council and Minister in Charge of Scientific and Industrial Research; and General Sir Brudenell White, Australian Chief of the General Staff.

• 1939 – First flight of the Vickers Warwick

• 1937 – Entered Service: Sikorsky XPBS-1

• 1936 – A Nationalist air raid off Málaga damages the Republican battleship Jaime I.

• 1932 – First flight of the Gee Bee Model R

• 1918 – Jarvis Jennes Offutt (1894–1918), becomes the first fatality among natives of Omaha, Nebraska in World War I, when his S.E.5 crashed during a training flight near Valheureux, France, and succumbs to his injuries. The Flying Field, Fort George Crook, Nebraska renamed Offutt Field, 6 May 1924.

• 1914 – The first British airplane to reach French soil after mobilization is a BE2a, serial number 327, flown by Capt. F. F. Waldron and Air Mechanic Skerritt of No. 2 Sqdr. RFC commanded by Maj. C. J. Burke.

• 1914 – A Royal Aircraft Factory BE.2 becomes the first British aircraft to arrive in France for the war.

• 1912 – During air-ground maneuvers held by the U.S. Army, at Stratford, Connecticut, Pvt. Beckwith Havens of the New York National Guard suffers engine failure in a Curtiss biplane at about 1000 ft (300 m) over a crowded parade ground, narrowly misses spectators and a cavalry troop as he swoops down, glides down the field and collides with a Burgess-Wright biplane that had just been flown by Lt. Benjamin Foulois, breaking off its tail. No injuries reported, and both aircraft are taken to hangars for repair.

• 1909 – Baddeck No. 1, Canada's second aircraft, is wrecked at Petawawa, Ontario. The pilot, JAD McCurdy, survived.

• 1824 – The first aerial ascent by a Native American as a passenger, Chief Waschisabe, in Dupuis-Delcourt's balloon “flotilla” takes place at Montjean, France.

August 14

• 2013 – UPS Airlines Flight 1354, the Airbus A300F4-622R cargo aircraft N155UP arriving from Louisville, Kentucky, with a crew of two aboard, crashes one-half mile (0.8 m) from the runway at Birmingham–Shuttlesworth International Airport outside of Birmingham, Alabama. Both crew members die.[1]

• 2012 – An unmanned experimental United States Air Force X-51A Waverider hypersonic aircraft launched from above the Point Mugu Naval Air Test Range in California goes out of control because of a fault in one of its control fins and crashes into the Pacific Ocean 15 seconds into its flight and before igniting its scramjet engine. The crash leaves only one surviving Waverider out of the four constructed.[2]

• 2009 – Australian airline Strategic Airlines commences operations.

• 2007 – CH-47D Chinook 89-00171 from B Company, 1–52 Aviation Regiment crashes near the al-Taqaddum air base west of Baghdad, killing five crew on board.[3][4][5]

• 2005 – Helios Airways Flight 522, a Boeing 737-300, crashes near Kalamos, Greece with 115 passengers and 6 crew members on board; there are no survivors.

• 2003 – A massive electrical blackout darkens much of the northeastern United States and Ontario, Canada, knocking out ticketing systems, baggage carousels and air conditioning at most airports. JetBlue hires Mister Softee trucks at New York-JFK to help cool down stranded, un-air conditioned passengers.

• 2003 – AH-64D Apache 01-5241 (ex AH-64A 87-0507) of 1–14th Aviation Regiment crashes in Iraq.[6]

• 1979 – Steve Hinton sets a new piston-engined airspeed record in a specially-modified P-51 Mustang named the Red Baron. He reaches 499 mph (803 km/h) over Nevada.

• 1974 – (14-16) Turkish Air Force aircraft support the final major Turkish offensive on Cyprus.

• 1974 – First flight of the Panavia Tornado

• 1972 – The 1972 Königs Wusterhausen air disaster: an Interflug Ilyushin Il-62, registered DM-SEA crashes near Königs Wusterhausen, all 156 passengers and crew are killed in Germany's worst air disaster.

• 1968 – Los Angeles Airways Flight 417, a Sikorsky S-61L prototype, crashes in Compton, California resulting in the loss of 21 lives.

• 1964 – Lockheed U-2A, 56-6955, Article 395, fifth and last airframe of the USAF supplementary production, delivered to the USAF in March 1959. Assigned to the 4080th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing, Laughlin AFB, Texas. Crashed near Boise, Idaho, this date. ROCAF pilot successfully ejects.

• 1953 – A Royal Australian Air Force Sabre fighter scares an unknown number of kangaroos as it becomes the first airplane to break the sound barrier over Australia.

• 1962 – NASA civilian test pilot Joseph A Walker takes X-15 to 60,000 m.

• 1962 – An East German Ilyushin Il-62 crashes on takeoff from East Berlin, killing 156.

• 1959 – Canadair was awarded a contract to manufacture the CF 104.

• 1959 – Martin XSM-68-1-MA Titan I missile B-5, 57-2692, explodes on launchpad at Launch Complex 19 during sub-orbital flight, Cape Canaveral, Florida, when its tie-down bolts explode prematurely as the vehicle builds up thrust. An umbilical generates a "no-go" signal prompting an engine-kill signal from the flight controls and the Titan loses all thrust, falls back through the launcher ring and explodes. The umbilical tower is damaged in the ensuing fire.

• 1958 – First flight of the Grumman Gulfstream I

• 1958 – KLM Flight 607-E, a Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation (named Hugo de Groot) en route from Amsterdam to New York, crashes into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after takeoff from Shannon Airport in Ireland, killing all 99 passengers and crew, including six members of the Egyptian fencing team.

• 1953 – The sound barrier is broken over Australia for the first time by Flight Lieutenant Bentleigh, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in the first Australian-built Sabre fighter at Avalon, Victoria.

• 1945 – V-J (Victory in Japan) Day.

• 1943 – Japanese aircraft raid the Allied air base at Marilinan, New Guinea.

• 1943 – Curtiss XP-60E-CU, 42-79425, is damaged in a forced landing just before being released to the USAAF for official trials. Becomes XP-60C when it is retrofit with wings, undercarriage, and other items from the XP-60A-CU, 42-79423. Meanwhile, original XP-60C-CU, 42-79424, becomes second XP-60E with removal of 2,000 hp (1,500 kW) R-2800-53 engine and contraprops, replaced with R-2800-10 engine and four-blade prop. Whole P-60 project is essentially a dead-end, being nothing more than Curtiss' attempt to stretch pre-war design that started out as the P-36, and the company's unwillingness or inability to start fresh with a new fighter design will force them out of the airframe business a few short years after the war.

• 1942 – A German Focke-Wulf Fw 200 C-4 Condor patrol bomber, NT+BY, had been tracked near Iceland by an RAF Northrop N-3B Nomad of No. 330 Squadron. When the bomber flew west of Reykjavik, it was attacked and damaged by 2LT Joseph D.R. Shaffer of the 342nd Composite Group, flying a Curtiss P-40C Warhawk. Shaffer's attack was followed up by two Lockheed P-38F Lightnings of the 27th Fighter Squadron which had stopped at Iceland to refuel while being ferried across the Atlantic Ocean to England. The P-38s, flown by MAJ John H. Weltman and 2LT Elza E. Shahan, shot down the Condor, which exploded and crashed into the sea. The crew of six were killed. Lieutenants Shaffer and Shahan were both credited with the victory and were awarded the Silver Star. This was the first U.S. Army Air Forces air combat victory in the European Theater of Operations.

• 1937 – (14-15) Imperial Japanese Navy Mitsubishi G3 M bombers based at Taihoku on Formosa and Ōmura on Kyūshū conduct over-ocean raids on Nationalist Chinese bases 400 to 500 miles (644 to 805 km) inland, demonstrating an operational range that astonishes both foreign observers and those of the Imperial Japanese Army. It is the first transoceanic bombing raid in history.

• 1937 – A Nationalist offensive in northern Spain against Basque forces defending Santander, begins, supported by 70 German – Including the latest models, being evaluated in combat for the first time – 80 Italian, and 70 Spanish Nationalist aircraft. Republican forces opposing them have only 33 fighters – only 18 of them modern Soviet aircraft – And 11 reconnaissance planes. The Nationalist aerial bombardment will overwhelm the defenders of Santander, which will fall to the Nationalists on August 26.

• 1937 – Vice Admiral Kiyoshi Hasegawa orders Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carriers to begin strikes against the coast of China, beginning several months of such operations.

• 1937 – Six Imperial Japanese Mitsubishi G3 M bombers are shot down while raiding Chinese air bases, marking the first air-to-air combat of World War II.

• 1932 – First successful single-lift rotor helicopter: Alexei Cheremukhin & Boris Yuriev’s TsAGI-1 EA, which flew to a record altitude of 605 m (1,985 ft).

• 1932 – 14-23 – Frances Mersalis and Louise Thaden set a women's endurance record of 8 days 4 hours.

• 1932 – 14-28 – The third International Tourist Aircraft Contest Challenge 1932 in Berlin, won by the Polish crew Franciszek Zwirko and Stanislaw Wigura on the RWD-6 plane.

• 1931 – Piloted by M. M. Gromov, the Tupolev ANT-14 large passenger aircraft makes its first flight. The largest landplane of its day, it could carry 36 passengers.

• 1915 – First flight of the Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.9

• 1914 – The first true bomber, the French Voisin III, is used in combat for the first time in an attack on German airship hangars at Metz-Frascaty, Germany.

• 1909 – The first woman passenger to fly in a powered airplane in Great Britain is the wife of Samuel F. Cody. She is taken for a 3-minute flight from the Royal Engineers Balloon Factory at Farnborough in Cody’s British Army Aeroplane No.1.

August 15

• 2012 – A Syrian Air Force strike hits a hospital in Aleppo, Syria, wounding one person. Human Rights Watch calls the attack a violation of international law.[1]

• 2007 – Lts. Ryan Betton, Cameron Hall and Jerry Smith were killed when their Grumman E-2C Hawkeye from Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron 120, based at the Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia, crashed in the Atlantic Ocean off North Carolina at ~2300 hrs. An investigation was unable to determine the cause of the crash, according to a copy of the Judge Advocate General final report — known as a JAGMAN — obtained by Navy Times. The plane catapulted off the deck of the carrier USS Harry S. Truman and crashed into the water moments later. The carrier never received any emergency radio transmissions or acknowledgment by the mishap crew, according to the report.

• 2006 – First flight of the Boeing EA-18G Growler

• 2005 – A US Navy Grumman C-2A Greyhound makes successful belly landing at Naval Air Station Norfolk, Virginia after undercarriage refuses to extend. Aircraft had departed Norfolk for NAS Pensacola, Florida, when problems were detected. Aircraft circled for two hours to burn fuel before making successful landing. None of 25 on board were injured.

• 1988 – First flight of the PZL Bielsko SZD-55

• 1976 – SAETA Flight 232, a Vickers Viscount 785D, goes missing mid-route from Quito to Cuenca, Ecuador; all 4 crew members and 55 passengers are killed, but the scene remains undiscovered for over 26 years until February 2003, when climbers on the eastern face of the stratovolcano Chimborazo come upon the site.

• 1975 – Lockheed U-2R, 68-10334, Article 056, sixth R-model airframe, first flown 18 May 1968, N814X allocated, delivered to 100th SRW, 10 June 1968. Crashes into the Gulf of Thailand approximately 50 miles S of U-Tapao, this date, when pilot Capt. Jon T. Little, 32, of Tucson, Arizona, ejects from the aircraft he was ferrying back to the U.S. from U-Tapao. Shortly after departing the Thai base in the company of another U-2R and a KC-135 on a dark night, the autopilot develops problems and Little loses control as it overspeeds. The tail separates and the pilot ejects, being rescued by a fishing boat in the Gulf of Thailand the next morning and takes Little to the Thai village of Patani near the Malaysian border. Although Little survives, he never flies a U-2 again, SAC tradition at the time. This is the second U-2R loss.

• 1972 – The final USAF mission over Cambodia is flown

• 1973 – In the Gulf of Tonkin off North Vietnam, USS Constellation (CVA-64) departs Yankee Station for the last time. She is the last aircraft carrier to operate at the station.

• 1969 – Operation About Face begins in Laos. Air America helicopters airlift Meo and Thai guerrillas led by Vang Pao behind enemy positions while the Royal Lao Army pushes across the Plain of Jars. Heavy American air support peaks at 300 sorties per day.

• 1958 – Congress approves a bill creating the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) to regulate all US commercial and military aviation.

• 1957 – USAF Captain Joe Bailey Jordan reaches a new altitude record of 31,513 m (103,389 ft) in a Lockheed F-104C-5-LO Starfighter, USAF serial number 56-885. (According to the online records data base of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, (FAI) this flight occurred 14 December 1959. (FAI Record File # 10354) During this flight Captain Jordan also set an FAI world record for Time to Altitude when his Starfighter reached an altitude of 30,000 meters in 15 minutes, 4.92 seconds. (FAI Record File # 9065)

• 1951 – William Barton Bridgeman sets a new altitude record in a Douglas D-558-II Skyrocket, Bu. No. 37934, NACA 144, of 79,494 ft (24,230 m)

• 1951 – British European Airways commences turboprop freight services

• 1949 – A de Havilland Tiger Moth makes the first service flight by an aircraft of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

• 1947 – The Royal Pakistan Air Force is formed.

• 1945 – Task Force 38 launches its last strike of the war, targeting Tokyo. A second strike jettisons its bombs in the sea when it receives word of the ceasefire agreement with Japan. In the final large dogfight of World War II, 15 to 20 Japanese planes jump six F6 F Hellcats of U.S. Navy Fighter Squadron 88 (VF-88) from USS Yorktown (CV-10); the Hellcats shoot down nine Japanese plans in exchange for four of their own.

• 1945 – Seven Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft make the last kamikaze attack of World War II.

• 1945 – Hirohito delivers a radio address telling his populace that Japan is surrendering. The formal signing of the surrender agreement aboard the USS Missouri would occur on Sept. 20th.

• 1945 – First flight of the Ilyushin Il-12

• 1944 – 1,300 Allied land-based bombers from Italy, Corsica, and Sardinia with escorting fighters strike targets in southern France against no German air opposition on the first morning of Operation Dragoon, the Allied amphibious invasion of southern France. The 1st Airborne Task Force makes a parachute landing as part of the invasion. Flying from the escort aircraft carrier USS Tulagi (CVE-72), U.S. Navy Observation Fighter Squadron 1 (VOF-1)—The first U.S. Navy fighter squadron with pilots trained as naval gunfire observers—makes its combat debut, relieving the more vulnerable battleship- and cruiser-based floatplanes of this duty. The only effective German air raid of the entire operation takes place that evening when a Junkers Ju 88 sinks the fully loaded tank landing ship USS LST-282 with a glide bomb off Cap Dramont.

• 1944 – The first air-to-air victory by a jet is scored by Feldwebel Helmut Lennartz, shooting down a B-17 Flying Fortress in a Messerschmitt Me 262

• 1943 – In Operation Cottage, American and Canadian forces invade Kiska, only to find that all Japanese had evacuated the island secretly on July 28. Employing 359 combat aircraft – The most it ever had during World War II – The Eleventh Air Force has conducted a continuous bombing campaign and dropped surrender leaflets for three weeks before the invasion, mostly against an uninhabited island Since June 1, the Eleventh Air Force has made 1,454 sorties against Kiska, dropping 1,255 tons (1,138,529 kg) of bombs.

• 1943 – The landings on Kiska end the 439-day-long Aleutian Islands campaign, during which the Eleventh Air Force has flown 3,609 combat sorties, dropped 3,500 tpns (3,175,179 kg) of bombs, lost 40 aircraft in combat and 174 to other causes, and suffered 192 aircraft damaged. U.S. Navy patrol aircraft have flown 704 combat sorties, dropped 590,000 pounds (267,622 kg) of bombs, and lost 16 planes in combat and 35 due to other causes. Including transport aircraft, the Allies have lost 471 aircraft during the campaign to all causes, while the Japanese have lost 69 aircraft in combat and about 200 to other causes.

• 1943 – U.S. forces land on Vella Lavella. The Japanese respond with air raids of 54, 59, and eight planes during the day, but do little damage, and U.S. Marine Corps F4U Corsair fighters strafe Kahili Airfield on Bougainville Island. The Japanese claim to have lost 17 planes, but U.S. forces claim 44 shot down.

• 1940 – First RCAF victory in the Battle of Britain was scored by S/L EA McNab who destroyed a Dornier Do 215 while with No. 111 Squadron RAF.

• 1940 – The heaviest fighting of the Battle of Britain occurs, with the loss of 46 British and 76 German aircraft.

• 1939 – Thirteen Junkers Ju 87s of 1 Gruppe, 76 Sturmkampfgeschwader, commanded by Captain Walter Sigel, crash during a demonstration on training area Neuhammer (now Świętoszów, Poland). All 26 crew members were killed. The planes dived through cloud, expecting to release their practice bombs and pull out of the dive once below the cloud ceiling, unaware that on that particular day the ceiling was too low and unexpected ground mist formed, leaving them no time to pull out of the dive.

• 1937 – 1937 – Lufthansa begins seaplane services between the Azores and New York with the assistance of seaplane tenders stationed along the route.

• 1935 – First flight of the Seversky P-35

• 1935 – Wiley Post and passenger Will Rogers died in the crash of Post's modified seaplane en route from Fairbanks to Point Barrow, Alaska, while taking off from a lagoon, after landing to ask directions.

August 16

• 2011 – The Government of Canada announces that the name of the Canadian Armed Forces Air Command will revert to "Royal Canadian Air Force," the name it had held as an independent armed service until 1968.[1]

• 2010 – AIRES Flight 8250, a Boeing 737-700 splits in three after a hard landing due to pilot error at Gustavo Rojas Pinilla Airport, San Andrés, Colombia. Out of the 125 passengers and 6 crew members on board, two passengers died and 113 were injured.

• 2010 – The Government of Canada announces that the name of the Canadian Armed Forces Air Command will revert to “Royal Canadian Air Force, ” the name it held as an independent armed service until 1968.

• 2009 – YV-212 T, a Britten-Norman Islander, ditches into the sea short of Simón Bolívar International Airport, Venezuela. The aircraft is written off but all nine people on board are rescued.

• 2009 – First flight of the AVCEN Jetpod, it crashed shortly after take-off from Taiping Airport, Malaysia, killing the pilot.

• 2009 – Two Russian Knights air display Sukhoi Su-27 jets collided whilst training, killing one pilot, Igor Tkachenko, and injuring several civilians on the ground. The accident occurred near Zhukovsky Airfield, outside of Moscow.

• 2009 – An Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force Bell 214ST crashed on a training flight near Karaj, Iran, four killed.

• 2006 – Colonel Herschel H. Green, U.S. Air Force (Ret.) American pilot and World War II Ace, died. Green was the leading ace of the Fifteenth Air Force downing 18 enemy aircraft and destroying 10 more on the ground. (b. 1920)

• 2005 – West Caribbean Airways Flight 708, a McDonnell Douglas MD-82, crashes in western Venezuela. All on board, 152 passengers and 8 crew members, die.

• 2002 – The 2002 Khankala Mi-26 crash occurred when Chechen rebels with a shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile brought down a Mil Mi-26 helicopter in a minefield and resulted in the death of 127 Russian troops and air crew. This is the greatest loss of life in the history of helicopter aviation and one of the deadliest disasters in Russian military history.

• 1995 – Concorde sets a new speed record for a round-the-world flight. It returns to JFK International Airport in New York after a journey lasting 31 hours 27 min, passing through Toulouse, Dubai, Bangkok, Guam, Honolulu and Acapulco.

• 1991 – Indian Airlines Flight 257, a Boeing 737, hits high ground during descent about 30 km from the Imphal airport. All six crew members and 63 passengers were killed.

• 1987 – Northwest Airlines Flight 255, an McDonnell Douglas MD-82, crashes on takeoff from Detroit as a result of pilot error. Of 155 on board, 4-year-old Cecelia Cichan is the only survivor.

• 1986 – Using a Strela 2 (SAM-7 GRAIL) surface-to-air missile, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army shoots down a Sudan Airways Fokker F-27 Friendship 400 M taking off from Malakai, Sudan, killing all 60 people on board.

• 1984 – First flight of the ATR 42

• 1980 – First flight of the Embraer EMB 312 Tucano

• 1972 – A Burma Airways Douglas C-47 crashes into the sea off Thandwe, Burma, killing 25 of 28 on board.

• 1969 – Darryl Greenamayer sets a new piston-engine airspeed record in a heavily modified Grumman F8F-2 Bearcat named Conquest I. His record speed of 776.45 km/h (482.46 mph) topples a record that had stood for 30 years. (FAI Record File Number 10366)

• 1965 – United Airlines Flight 389, a Boeing 727, crashes into Lake Michigan at night, after the pilots apparently misread their altimeters; all 24 passengers and six crew perish in the first fatal crash of the Boeing 727.

• 1960 – Captain (later Colonel) Joseph Kittinger (USAF) sets a world record for highest parachute jump (102,800 ft or 31,333 m) and longest parachute freefall (85,300 ft or 25,999 m) while testing high altitude parachute escape systems in Project Excelsior.

• 1952 – First flight of the Bristol Britannia from Filton, Bristol, England.

• 1948 – First flight of the Northrop F-89 Scorpion

• 1947 – The first flight of the de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver. The first production aircraft was delivered to the Ontario Department of Lands and Forests, a design partner, in April 1948.

• 1944 – The Messerschmitt Me 163 rocket-powered interceptor is used against enemy bombers for the first time no earlier than 17 Aug 1944. Their base was bombed on 16 Aug forcing them to flush.

• 1943 – Royal Navy Grumman Avenger I, out of Naval Auxiliary Air Facility Lewiston, Maine, ditches in Sebago Lake near Raymond, Maine and sinks. Crew uninjured. Plane listed as missing, so it’s still out there.

• 1942 – U.S. Navy airship L-8, a former Goodyear advertising blimp, of ZP-32, departed Treasure Island, San Francisco, California, with crew of two officer-pilots. Five hours later the partially deflated L-8 is sighted drifting over Daly City, California where it touches down sans crew. Nothing is ever found of Lt. Ernest D. Cody and Ensign Charles E. Adams. It is assumed that they were lost over water but were never found. The control car from this blimp is now in the National Museum of Naval Aviation, NAS Pensacola, Florida.

• 1942 – The 82nd Airborne (All American) paratroop division is formed.

• 1936 – Seaplanes from Barcelona support a Republican landing on Majorca. In reaction, three Italian Savoia-Marchetti SM.81 bombers, three Italian Fiat CR.32 fighters, and various Spanish Nationalist aircraft are sent to be based on the island. The presence of the CR.32 s precludes any further Republican air attacks on Majorca.

• 1933 – Stuart Roosa, American astronaut and command pilot of Apollo 14, was born. (d. 1994)

• 1918 – Royal Navy Air Service airship, R27, destroyed in a hangar fire at RNAS Howden along with a makeshift SSZ class blimp and two SSZ class blimps, SSZ.38 and SSZ.54. One airman dies.

August 17

• 2008 – 2008 Coventry Airport collision, mid-air collision of two light aircraft on final approach to Coventry Airport. All 5 crew and passengers killed.

• 1988 – Death of Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq: President of Pakistan Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq dies in the crash of a C-130 Hercules transport near Bahawalpur, Pakistan.

• 1988 – 50 people set a world record for flying in a single hot air balloon (Lelystad, Netherlands)

• 1988 – A PAF Lockheed C-130B Hercules, 23494, 'R' (ex-USAF 62-3494), c/n 3708, crashes near the Pakistani town of Bahawalpur, killing everyone aboard, including the President of Pakistan General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, American Ambassador to Pakistan Arnold Lewis Raphel, Head of Pakistan's military intelligence General Akther Abdul Rehman and nearly all of the top military brass of the Pakistan Army.
• 1986 - First flight of Tsunami, an experimental purpose-built racing aircraft.

• 1979 – Two Soviet Aeroflot jetliners collide in mid-air over Ukraine, killing 156

• 1978 – The U. S. balloon, Double Eagle II, becomes the first balloon to cross the Atlantic. The trip begins in Maine and ends almost 6 days later in France.

• 1978 – Introduction: General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon

• 1965 – Sikorsky HSS-1N Seabat, BuNo 149841, c/n 58-1430, coded '136', of the Koninklijke Marine, crashes near Noordwijk, Netherlands.

• 1961 – First flight of the Handley Page HP.115

• 1956 – First flight of the Boeing C-135 Stratolifter

• 1946 – The first person in the U. S. to be ejected from an airplane by means of its emergency escape equipment is Sergeant Lambert at Wright Field in Ohio.

• 1945 – Two Boeing B-29 Superfortress bombers collide over Weatherford, Texas during a bomber training exercise. Eight crew members were killed, 2 managed to escape from the falling wreckage and parachute to safety. Boeing B-29A Superfortress, 42-93895, of the 234th Combat Crew Training Squadron, Clovis Army Air Field, New Mexico, and Boeing B-29 Superfortress, 44-86276, of the 231st CCTS, Alamagordo Army Air Field, New Mexico, involved.

• 1945 – During Operation Dodge, the RAF airlift of troops home from Italian deployment, Avro Lancaster, ME834, coded 'K-OG', of 115 Squadron, based at RAF Graveley, struck HK798, coded 'K-OH', of the same squadron, and PB754, coded 'TL-A', of Graveley-based 35 Squadron when it swerves off runway while taking off from Bari, Italy.

• 1943 – World War II – The U. S. Eighth Air Force suffers the loss of 60 bombers on the Schweinfurt-Regensburg mission.

• 1943 – 164 U. S. Army Air Forces aircraft of the Fifth Air Force attack Japanese airfields at Wewak, New Guinea, destroying 70 planes while the Japanese are servicing them for another raid on Marilinan.

• 1943 – 59 USAAF bombers are lost in raids on Regensburg and Schweinfurt.

• 1943 – The last Axis forces evacuate Sicily, bringing the Sicily campaign to an end. The U. S. Army Air Forces have lost 28 killed, 41 wounded, and 88 missing during the campaign.

• 1943 – First operational use of the radio-controlled Henschel Hs 293 anti-ship missile

• 1943 – (17-18) The German Luftwaffe makes two 80-plane raids by Junkers Ju 88 s against Bizerte, Tunisia, where Allied ships are assembling for the invasion of mainland Italy. They sink an infantry landing craft, damage three other vessels, destroy oil installations, kill 22 men, and wound 215.

• 1943 – 17-18 – RAF bombers attack the German missile research station at Peenemünde.

• 1942 – Heavy bombers of the United States Army Air Forces’ Eighth Air Force carry out their first raid, attacking a railroad marshalling yard at Rouen, France.

• 1942 – First crash of a Messerschmitt Me 262 occurs when pilot Heinrich Beauvais, of the Rechlin test center, fails to achieve flying speed on his first take-off in the type from Leipheim air field, overruns runway, wipes out in adjacent potato field. Both engines of the Me 262 V3 prototype are torn from the nacelles, both wings damaged, starboard wheel shorn off, but airframe is deemed repairable. Pilot uninjured.

• 1942 – Grumman XF6F-3 Hellcat, BuNo 02982, first flown 30 July 1942, suffers engine failure of Pratt & Whitney R-2800-10 on test flight out of Bethpage, New York, Grumman test pilot Bob Hall dead-sticks into a farmer's field on Long Island, survives unpowered landing but airframe heavily damaged.

• 1940 – Billy Fiske – American aviator and Olympic athlete, died as the first American pilot casualty of World War II during the Battle of Britain. (b. 1911).

• 1940 – No. 1 (Fighter) Squadron became operational and commenced patrols from its base at Northholt, England.

• 1929 – Francis Gary Powers, American U-2 pilot whose U-2 spy plane was shot down while over the Soviet Union, thus causing the U-2 Crisis of 1960, was born. (d. 1977).

• 1927 – The Dole Derby Air Race, also known as the Dole Derby, was a tragic air race to cross the Pacific Ocean from northern California to the Territory of Hawaii in August 1927. Of the 15-18 entrant airplanes, 11 were certified to compete but three crashed before the race, resulting in three deaths. Eight eventually participated in the race, with two crashing on takeoff and two going missing during the race. A third, forced to return for repairs, took off again to search for the missing and was itself never seen again. In all, before, during, and after the race, ten lives were lost and six airplanes were total losses. Two of the eight planes successfully landed in Hawaii. 1925 – Entered Service: Curtiss P-1 Hawk with 1st Pursuit Group, United States Army Air Service

• 1918 – First flight of the Martin MB-1

• 1917 – Tasked to study how the United Kingdom’s air forces could be best organized for the war with Germany and to consider whether or not they should remain subordinate to the British Army and Royal Navy, General Jan Smuts completes the Smuts Report. In it, he observes that an air service could be used as “an independent means of war operations, ” that “there is absolutely no limit to the scale of its future independent war service, ” that soon “aerial operations with their devastation of enemy lands and destruction of industrial and populous centres on a vast scale may be the principal operations of war, to which older forms of military and naval operations may become secondary and subordinate. ” He projects that by the summer of 1918 “the air battle front will be far behind the Rhine” while the ground front is still bogged down in Belgium and France and that air attacks on German industry and lines of communication could be an “important factor in bringing about peace. ” The report is the foundation of a new theory of warfare advocated by British bomber advocates and will inspire the creation of the independent Royal Air Force in 1918.

• 1914 – The Imperial Japanese Navy’s first aviation ship, Wakamiya, is recommissioned as a seaplane carrier.

• 1910 – The first English Channel crossing by an airplane with a passenger is made by John Moisant who takes his mechanic in his two-seater Blariot on the flight from Calais, France to Dover, England.

• 1890 – Stefan Bastyr, Polish aviation pioneer and pilot of the first military flight in the history of the Polish Air Force, was born. (d. 1920)

August 18

• 2012 – Suffering engine trouble, an Aviatour Air Piper PA-34-200 Seneca I crashes in the sea off Masbate in the Philippines, killing three of the four people on board and injuring the lone survivor. Among the dead is Philippine Secretary of the Interior Jesse Robredo, whose body will be recovered from the sea on 21 August.[1]

• 2003 – A Polish Sukhoi Su-22M-4K, of 8 ELT, flying at 3000 meter (10,000 ft) altitude, during antiaircraft artillery exercises, is shot down at 1600 hrs. within the confines of the Wicko Morskie range, near Ustka by 2K12 Kub missile. Another account ascribes the downing merely to a "technical malfunction". The pilot, Lt. Col. Andrzej Andrzejewski, safely ejected and alighted in Baltic Sea 21 km (11 nmi) from the coast, and – after one-and-half hour spent in water – picked up by Mi-14PS SAR helicopter from Siemirowice Air Base. Andrzejewski will subsequently perish on 23 January 2008, CASA C-295 crash.

• 1989 – A Qantas Boeing 747, (747-438), VH-OJA, City of Canberra, flies non-stop from London to Sydney, setting a world record for a four engine jet, after having flown 17,039.00 kilometers (10,587.54 miles) in 20 hours, 9 minutes, 5 seconds at an average speed of 845.58 kilometers per hour (525.42 miles per hour). FAI Record File Numbers 2201, 2202. This flight took place 16–17 August 1989.

• 1988 – Aleksandr V. Shchukin, a test pilot for the eventually-scrapped Buran shuttle program, is killed when his Sukhoi Su-26M crashes this date.

• 1978 – First flight of the Pilatus PC-7 (Production)

• 1974 – Lockheed C-141A Starlifter, 65-0274, of the 437th MAW, Charleston AFB, South Carolina, hits Mount Potosi at the 19,000 foot level, ~17 miles from destination, John F. Kennedy International Airport, La Paz, Bolivia, killing seven crew.

• 1967 – First flight of the Handley Page Jetstream

• 1965 – First flight of the Kamov Ka-26

• 1963 – Twin accidents aboard the USS Constellation (CV-64) kill three. First, an McDonnell F-4B-10-MC Phantom II, BuNo 149436, 'NK', of VF-143, snaps arresting cable during night landing, goes over the side, pilot Lt. Robert J. Craig, 31, of San Diego is lost with his unidentified RIO, three deck crew injured by whipping cable. Then several hours later, in unrelated accident, Missile Technician 2nd Class Robert William Negus, originally from Lompoc, California, is crushed by a missile, the Navy in San Diego reported.

• 1960 – A C-119 Flying Boxcar recovers a data capsule from the Discoverer 14 satellite in mid-air.

• 1951 – RCAF aerobatic team flying DH 100 Vampire fighters performed at the National Air Races in Detroit, Michigan.

• 1951 – Boeing XB-47-BO Stratojet, 46-065, first prototype of two, stalls on landing, suffers major structural damage. No injuries. Another source cites date of 18 August 1950.

• 1945 – Last U.S. air combat casualty of World War II occurs during mission 230 A-8, when two Consolidated B-32 Dominators of the 386th Bomb Squadron, 312th Bomb Group, launch from Yontan Airfield, Okinawa, for a photo reconnaissance run over Tokyo, Japan. Both bombers are attacked by several Japanese fighters of both the 302nd Air Group at Atsugi and the Yokosuka Air Group that make 10 gunnery passes. Japanese aces Sadamu Komachi and Saburo Sakai are part of this attack. B-32 piloted by 1st Lt. John R. Anderson, is hit at 20,000 feet, cannon fire knocks out number two (port inner) engine, and three crew are injured, including Sgt. Anthony J. Marchione, 19, of the 20th Reconnaissance Squadron, who takes 20 mm hit to the chest, dying 30 minutes later. Tail gunner Sgt. John Houston destroys one attacker. Lead bomber, Consolidated B-32-20-CF Dominator, 42-108532, "Hobo Queen II", piloted by 1st Lt. James Klein, is not seriously damaged but second Consolidated B-32-35-CF Dominator, 42-108578, loses engine, has upper turret knocked out of action, and loses partial rudder control. Both bombers land at Yontan Airfield just past ~1800 hrs. after surviving the last air combat of the Pacific war. The following day, propellers are removed from Japanese aircraft as part of surrender agreement. Marchione is buried on Okinawa on 19 August, his body being returned to his Pottstown, Pennsylvania home on 18 March 1949. He is interred in St. Aloysius Old Cemetery with full military honors. B-32, 42-108578, was scrapped at Kingman, Arizona after the war.

• 1945 – Seven Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft make the last kamikaze attack of World War II.

• 1944 – The U. S. Navy submarine USS Rasher (SS-269) torpedoes and sinks the Japanese aircraft carrier Taiyō off Cape Bolinao, Luzon, with the loss of 747 lives. There are over 400 survivors.

• 1943 – RCAF contributed 74 aircraft to the RAF attack on the German rocket experimental facility at Peenemunde.

• 1943 – Following a Royal Air Force bombing raid on the test facilities at Peenemünde on 17 August, the Messerschmitt Me 163B Komets of training unit EK 16 are moved to a new airfield at Anklam. The airframes are towed to the new location, with one Komet, suffering malfunctioning flap hydraulics, ferried by test pilot Paul Rudolf Opitz. After casting-off from the tow plane, the rocket fighter's landing skid fails to function, the airframe decelerates over a patch of rough and rutted ground at the end of the landing run following an otherwise normal approach. Pilot suffers two damaged vertebrae due to hard landing, spends three months in hospital. Investigation reveals that a force of 15 to 30Gs were required to cause this injury, and Me 163Bs are subsequently fitted with a torsion sprung seat for the pilot, eliminating this type of injury

• 1942 – (Overnight) – Royal Air Force Bomber Command’s Pathfinder Force flies its first mission, with 31 Pathfinder aircraft attempting to mark the target – The German submarine base at Flensburg – For a main force of 87 bombers. The raid is a complete failure; Flensburg is untouched, and the aircraft scatter their bombs widely over the towns of Sønderborg and Aabenraa in Denmark. One Pathfinder aircraft and three other bombers fail to return.

• 1941 – The Butt Report is issued. It reveals a widespread failure of Royal Air Force Bomber Command aircraft to deliver their payloads to the correct target.

• 1941 – The U. S. Navy commissions Naval Air Station Midway at Midway Atoll.

• 1937 – Col. William Caldwell McChord, (1881–1937), rated a junior military aviator in 1918, was killed while trying to force-land his Northrop A-17, 35-105, near Maidens, Virginia. At the time of his death, he was Chief of the Training and Operations Division in HQ Army Air Corps. Tacoma Field, Washington, was renamed McChord Field, 17 December 1937.

• 1932 – 18-19 – Jim Mollison makes the first solo East-to-West crossing of the Atlantic, flying a de Havilland Puss Moth from Dublin to New Brunswick

• 1932 – Auguste Piccard and Max Cosyns set a new balloon altitude record of 16,201 m (53,153 ft).

• 1930 – Captain Wolfgang von Gronau and crew make the first east to west crossing of the Atlantic from Germany to New York.

• 1926 – An Air Union Blériot 155 crashes while attempting an emergency landing at College Farm, Hurst, Aldington due to engine failure, killing 3 of 15 on board; the pilot initially survives, but dies a day later.

• 1922 – Arthur Martens makes the first sailplane flight of over one hour at the Wasserkuppe. His aircraft, named Vampyr (“Vampire”) is designed by Wolfgang Klemmperer.

• 1911 – The sole Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.1 crashes at Farnborough, pilot Lt. Theodore J. Ridge killed. Ridge was an inexperienced pilot, despite being Assistant Superintendent at the factory (who had only been awarded his Pilot's certificate the day before, and was described as "an absolutely indifferent flyer"). The combination of the unskilled pilot and the marginally controllable aircraft proved fatal - the S.E.1 stalled in a turn and spun in, killing Ridge. No further development of this one-off design undertaken.

• 1903 – Karl Jatho makes a flight with his motored airplane in front of 4 people. His craft flies up to 200 feet (60 m) up to few yards/m above the ground in a powered heavier-than-air craft.

• 1901 – At the invitation of Chanute, Wilbur Wright addresses the Western Society of Engineers in Chicago with a 10,000-word paper titled “Some Aeronautical Experiments. ”

• 1871 – Alphonse Pénaud achieves the first flight of an inherently stable airplane when his Planophore is flown 131 feet 11 seconds before the Société de Navigation Aérienne in the Tuileries Gardens, Paris.

• 1805 – First woman to pilot her own balloon: Sophie Blanchard, when she flew solo from the garden of the Cloister of the Jacobins in Toulouse.

August 19

• 2012 – An Alfa Airlines Antonov An-26-100 carrying a Sudanese government delegation to an Eid al-Fitr festival crashes in the mountains around Talodi in the state of South Kordofan in southern Sudan, killing all 32 people on board. Among the dead are Sudan's Minister of Religious Affairs Ghazi al-Sadiq, Minister for Youth and Sports Mahjoub Abdel Raheem Toutou, and Minister for Tourism, Antiquities, and Wildlife Eissa Daifallah, several members of the Sudanese Armed Forces and state security service, and a state media television crew.[1]

• 2009 – A United States Army Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk from Fort Campbell, Kentucky the home base of the 101st Airborne crashes while on a training exercise being carried-out by the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne). The accident occurred 400 ft below the summit of the 14,421 feet high (4,268 m) Mount Massive in the Sawatch Range, Colorado leaving 2 crew dead, 1 injured and 1 crew member missing.

• 2002 – Russian Air Force Mil Mi-26 helicopter is shot down by Chechen rebels using a portable SAM, probably an Igla, in Khankala, Russia. Of the 152 on board, 118 are killed.

• 1996 – Spair Airlines Flight PAR-3601, an Ilyushin Il-76, crashes near Belgrade with twelve fatalities.
• 1993 – USAF aircraft are attacked by Surface-to-air missiles over northern Iraq. The launch site is destroyed in retaliation

• 1982 – First flight of the Hawk GAFHawk

• 1982 – Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya became the second woman to be launched into space.

• 1981 – Indian Airlines Flight 557 was a domestic scheduled passenger flight from Bangalore to Mangalore which overran the runway at Mangalore Bajpe Airport.

• 1981 – Two Libyan Air Force Sukhoi Su-22s are shot down off of the Libyan coast by two United States Navy Grumman F-14A Tomcats of VF-41 from USS Nimitz.

• 1981 – A Royal Australian Air Force Bell UH-1 Iroquois fatally crashed at Willamstown, New South Wales. All UH-1Bs are grounded.

• 1980 – Saudia Flight 163, a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, lands at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when a fire breaks out on board; the evacuation of the plane is delayed and all 301 on board die.

• 1969 – Embraer is founded by Brazil’s Ministry of Aeronautics.

• 1968 – Handley Page Victor K.1 XH646 of No. 214 Squadron RAF collided in mid-air near Holt, Norfolk, United Kingdom in bad weather with a 213 Squadron English Electric Canberra WT325, all four crew members of the Victor died.

• 1967 – U. S. Marine Corps Captain Stephen W. Pless, piloting a UH-1E attack helicopter near Quang Ngai, South Vietnam, drives Viet Cong forces away from Americans stranded on a beach and then lands under heavy fire to rescue them. He will receive the Medal of Honor for his actions, and his crew will receive the Navy Cross.

• 1963 – Two Boeing B-47 Stratojets of the 40th Bombardment Wing from Schilling AFB, Salina, Kansas, collide in mid-air over Irwin, Iowa during a nine-hour navigation, air-refuelling and radar bomb scoring mission. Bombers depart Schilling at 1125 hrs. and 1126 hrs., then collide in overcast shortly after 1230 hrs., coming down on two farms ~2 miles apart. Two crew DOA at Harlan Hospital, Irwin, Iowa, three treated for injuries, one located alive. SAC identifies three survivors as Capt. Richard M. Smiley, 29, of Arlington, Kansas, aircraft commander of one B-47; Capt. Allan M. Ramsey, Jr., 32, of Bainbridge, Georgia, Smiley's navigator; Capt. Richard M. Snowden, 29, navigator on second B-47. Listed as missing: Capt. Leonard A. Theis, 29, San Fernando, California, co-pilot on second B-47; dead is Capt. Peter J. Macchi, 29, Belleville, New Jersey, Smiley's co-pilot; second fatality not immediately identified. Smiley suffers head injuries, Ramsey, back injuries, and Snowden, burns and leg injuries.

• 1963 – A USAF Boeing QB-47E Stratojet, of the 3205th Drone Director Group, veers off course on touchdown at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, crashing onto Eglin Parkway parallel to runway 32/14. Two cars were crushed by the Stratojet, killing two occupants, Robert W. Glass and Dr. Robert Bundy, and injuring a third, Dorothy Phillips. Mr. Glass and Dr. Bundy both worked for the Minnesota Honeywell Corporation at the time, a firm which had just completed flight tests on an inertia guidance sub-system for the X-20 Dyna-Soar project at the base utilizing a McDonnell NF-101B Voodoo. Mrs. Phillips was the wife of Master Sergeant James Phillips, a crew chief at the base. Mrs. Phillips was treated for moderate injuries and released later that day. Both vehicles were destroyed by fire. Four firefighters were treated for smoke inhalation while fighting the blaze which reignited several times. Fire crews had to lay over a mile of hose to reach the crash from the nearest hydrant, as well. The QB-47 was used for Bomarc Missile Program tests, which normally operated from Auxiliary Field Three (Duke Field), approximately 15 miles from the main base, but was diverted to Eglin Main after thunderstorms built up over Duke.

• 1960 – In Moscow, downed American U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers is sentenced to ten years imprisonment by the Soviet Union for espionage.

• 1960 – Sputnik 5 – The Soviet Union launches the satellite with the dogs Belka and Strelka, 40 mice, 2 rats and a variety of plants.

• 1959 – 1959 Transair Douglas Dakota accident occurred when it crashed into a mountain in Spain, killing all 32 on board.

• 1958 – First flight of the Lockheed P-3 Orion

• 1957 – 19-20 – Maj David Simons sets a new balloon altitude record of 101,516 ft (30,942 m).

• 1955 – Sixth of 13 North American X-10s, GM-19312, c/n 6, on Navaho X-10 flight number 16, out of Edwards AFB, California, demonstrates planned automated landing on first AFMTC flight, but drag chute does not deploy after landing. The vehicle overruns the skid strip, the nosewheel collapses in the sand in the overrun, the tanks rupture, and the vehicle burns.

• 1949 – A British European Airways Douglas DC-3 crashes into a hillside near Oldham, United Kingdom; of the 32 on board, only 8 survive.

• 1945 – Pilot 1st Lt. James K. Holt ferries captured Messerschmitt Me 262A, 500098, "Cookie VII", FE-4011, from Newark Army Air Base, New Jersey to Freeman Field, Indiana, with a refuelling stop at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at ~ 1600 hrs, as one of two Messerschmitts being sent for testing after arriving in the U.S. aboard the HMS Reaper. Upon landing at Pittsburgh, he experiences complete brake failure, overruns the runway, goes down steep incline, hits opposite side of ditch, tearing engines and undercarriage off of the jet and breaking the fuselage in half. Pilot is unhurt but airframe is a total loss.

• 1945 – Two Mitsubishi G4Ms carry Japan's surrender delegation to Ie Shima

• 1944 – 110 Seafire and Hellcat fighters from seven British and two American escort aircraft carriers supporting Operation Dragoon fly an armed reconnaissance toward Toulouse, France, where they destroy locomotives and rolling stock. They encounter German aircraft—one Junkers Ju 88, three Heinkel He 111 s, and one Dornier Do 217—for the first time during the operation and shoot all of them down.

• 1943 – Generaloberst Hans Jeschonnek, the Chief of the General Staff of the Luftwaffe, commits suicide.

• 1942 – Six fighter and two army co-operation squadrons of the RCAF supported the Canadian attack on Dieppe, France.

• 1940 – The first combat mission of the Imperial Japanese Navy’s Mitsubishi A6 M Zero (Allied reporting name “Zeke”) fighter takes place, as 12 Zeroes escort 54 Mitsubishi G3 M (Allied reporting name “Nell”) bombers over Chungking, but no Chinese aircraft rise to meet them.

• 1940 - At Mines Field (now known as Los Angeles International Airport), the first North American Aviation B-25 twin-engine medium bomber, serial number 40-2165, took off on its first flight with test pilot Vance Breese at the controls and engineer Roy Ferren in the co-pilot’s position.

• 1929 – The first metal airship built for the U. S. Navy makes its first flight. The ZMC-2 is a 22,600 cu. ft. helium balloon supported by transverse metal frames and longitudinal stiffeners with a thin metal covering forming the outer skin.

• 1921 – Gene Roddenberry, B-17 combat pilot and winner of the Distinguished Flying Cross for his actions in the U. S. Army Air Corps in the Pacific Theatre of World War II, was born in El Paso, Texas. Roddenberry was also a producer, screenwriter and creator of Star Trek. He became one of the first people to be buried in space upon his death 1991.

• 1919 – The United States readopts its pre-January 1918 official national insignia for U. S. Army, U. S. Navy, and U. S. Marine Corps aircraft, a white star centered in a blue circle with a red disc centered within the star. The marking will remain in use until June 1, 1942.

• 1918 – First of three crashes of new Fokker E.V. (Eindekker V, or monoplane five), six of which are delivered to Jasta 6 of the Imperial German Air Service on 7 August, to occur in a week, kills Leutnant Emil Rolff when wing fails, and, like the Fokker Triplane before it, the type is grounded for investigation. Problem traced to shoddy workmanship at the Mecklenburg factory where defective wood spars, water damage to glued parts, and pins carelessly splintering the members instead of securing them are discovered. Upon return to service two months later, design is renamed the Fokker D.VIII in an effort to distance type's reputation as a killer. Rolff had scored the first kill in the type on 17 August.

• 1918 – A US. Navy Curtiss 18-T-1 triplane flown by Curtiss test pilot Roland Rholfs establishes a new world speed record of 163 mph (232.32 km/hr) carrying a load of 1,076 lbs.

• 1915 – Lt Oswald Boelcke shoots down his first aircraft flying a Fokker E.I fitted with interrupter gear.

• 1911 – British naval officer Comdr. Charles R. Samson sets a new British endurance record of 4 hours, 58 min, 30 seconds. The Short S.38 biplane has special tanks allowing sufficient fuel for more than 4 hours flying.

• 1871 – Orville Wright was born in Dayton, Ohio. He was co-inventor, with his brother Wilbur, of the first airplane to achieve powered, sustained, and controlled flight and the first fully practical powered airplane. Orville piloted the famous first flight at Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina after winning a coin flip against his brother.

• 1913 – 700 feet above Buc, France, parachutist Adolphe Pégoud becomes the first person to jump from an airplane and land safely.

[1]

August 20

• 2011 – First Air Flight 6560, a Boeing 737, crashes while on approach to Resolute Bay Airport, Nunavut, Canada, killing 12 of 15 on board.

• 2011 – A BAE Systems Hawk T.1 of the RAF's Red Arrows aerobatic team crashed during a public display at Bournemouth Air Festival, killing the pilot.

• 2011 – As the Battle of Tripoli begins, Libyan rebels capture Tripoli International Airport[2] and launch an assault on Mitiga International Airport east of Tripoli.[2]

• 2008 – Spanair Flight 5022, a McDonnell Douglas MD-82 crashes on takeoff at Barajas Airport in Madrid, Spain. Of the 172 people on board, 154 are killed.

• 2007 – Loch Lomond Seaplanes launches scheduled services from Glasgow Seaplane Terminal to Oban in Scotland.

• 2007 – China Airlines Flight 120, a Boeing 737-809 with 165 people on board, catches fire after landing at Naha Airport on Okinawa, Japan. There are no fatalities; three people on the aircraft one member of the ground crew are injured.

• 2002 – First flight of the KAI T-50 Golden Eagle

• 1992 – First flight of the HAL Dhruv

• 1986 – First test-flight of a propfan engine, the General Electric GE-36

• 1978 – Entered Service: British Aerospace Sea Harrier

• 1977 – The Voyager 2 unmanned interplanetary spacecraft is launched aboard a Titan IIIE/Centaur rocket from Cape Canaveral, tasked mainly with photographing Venus, Neptune and Saturn. As of today, Voyager 2 is still monitored and tracked from 15 hrs 26 mins 15 secs of light-travel time from Earth.[3] Flight logs continue at: [4]

• 1970 – First flight of the Sikorsky S-67 Blackhawk

• 1969 – First flight of the FMA IA 58 Pucará

• 1963 – First flight of the BAC One-Eleven

• 1955 – Flying a U. S. Air Force North American F-100 C Super Sabre, Horace A. Haines sets a world speed record of 822.135 mph (1,323.889 km/hr).

• 1953 – Using aerial refueling, 17 U. S. Air Force F-84G Thunderjets make the longest-ever nonstop flight by jet fighters, flying 4,485 miles (7,218 km) from the United States to the United Kingdom.

• 1948 – A Boeing B-29-15-BA Superfortress, 42-63442, crashes near Rapid City, South Dakota shortly after take off from Rapid City AFB, killing all 17 on board

• 1947 – Flying the first Douglas D-558-1 Skystreak, Bu. No. 37970, Commander Turner F. Caldwell, United States Navy, set a new world air speed record of 640.744 mph (1,031.178 km/h) over a 3-kilometer course at Muroc Army Air Field, California. (FAI Record File Number 9864)

• 1946 – A captured Messerschmitt Me 262A, Wrknr. 111711, FE-0107, 711, crashed Tuesday afternoon ~two miles S of Xenia, Ohio near Route 68, test pilot Walter J. McAuley, Jr., of the Flight Performance Section, Flight Test Division, Wright Field, Ohio, successfully parachuting to safety. This brand new airframe had been surrendered on 31 March 1945 by Messerschmitt test pilot Hans Fay who defected during a functional check flight rather than fly it to an operational unit, landing at Rhein-Main, Frankfurt, the first Me 262 to fall into Allied hands.

• 1944 – Aircraft of a U. S. Navy antisubmarine hunter-killer group score their final kill of an enemy submarine in the Atlantic during World War II, when FM Wildcats and TBM Avengers of Composite Squadron 42 (VC-42) from the escort aircraft carrier USS Bogue (CVE-9) sink the German submarine U-1229 300 nautical miles (560 km) south of Cape Race, Newfoundland. Aircraft of U. S. hunter-killer groups have sunk—or cooperated with surface warships in sinking—32 German and two Japanese submarines in the Atlantic.

• 1942 – The U. S. Army Air Forces activate the Twelfth Air Force.

• 1942 – István Horthy (the son of the Hungarian regent Miklós Horthy), serving as a fighter pilot with 1/1 Fighter Squadron of the Royal Hungarian Air Force is killed in Russia when his MÁVAG Héja ("Hawk"), "V.421", a Hungarian fighter based on the Reggiane Re.2000, crashes shortly after takeoff from an air field near Ilovskoye.

• 1941 – No. 415 (Coastal) Squadron was formed in England.

• 1939 – Since the beginning of the Khalkhin Gol Incident on May 11, the Soviet Union has claimed 320 Japanese aircraft shot down and another 35 destroyed on the ground.

• 1939 – The last rigid airship, the Graf Zeppelin (LZ 130) makes its last flight.

• 1936 – Prototype Vought XSB2U-1 Vindicator, BuNo 9725, accepted by the U.S. Navy on 2 July 1936, crashes in Virginia.

• 1935 – Boeing test pilot Les Tower flies the Model 299 nonstop from Seattle to Dayton and establishes an unofficial record of flying 2,100 miles at an average speed of 232 miles.

• 1923 – Completed: USS Shenandoah (ZR-1)[5]

• 1919 – The first regularly scheduled passenger service by airship begins with Zeppelin LZ 120 Bodenese's first flight at Friedrichshafen, Germany.

• 1915 – The first sustained aerial bombing of cities offensive is made by Italian Caproni Ca.2s against Austria-Hungary.

• 1910 – The first U. S. Army experiments with firing a rifle from an airplane takes place when United States Army Lieutenant Jacob Earl Fickel conducts firing trials from a Curtiss two-seater biplane piloted by Curtiss himself.

• 1908 – Robert Gastambide becomes the first passenger carried by a monoplane when he is taken up on the Antoinette II.

• 1908 – The Wright Flyer built for flight trials before the U. S. Army arrives at Fort Myer, near Washington, D. C., eight days ahead of schedule. Before trials begin, tests to check transportability, another stipulation, start.

• 1901 – The Wright brothers leave Kitty Hawk, N. C., at the end of their second season of testing gliders and return to Dayton, Ohio.

August 21

• 2012 – Afghan insurgents fire rockets at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan, damaging the Boeing C-17 Globemaster III of United States Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey while Dempsey is in his quarters on the base. The damage forces Dempsey to use a different aircraft when he departs Afghanistan later in the day.[1]

• 2009 – An Indian Navy British Aerospace Sea Harrier FRS.51 crashes shortly after take-off from Dabolim Airport near Goa, India. The aircraft on a routine flight crashed in to the Arabian Sea of the coast of Goa killing the pilot Lt. Cdr. Saurav Saxena.

• 1998 – A Lumbini Airways de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter crashed in a mountainous region near Ghorepani, Nepal. All of the 18 people on board were killed.

• 1998 – An Insitu Aerosonde named Laima becomes the first UAV to cross the Atlantic Ocean, completing the flight in 26 hours.

• 1995 – Atlantic Southeast Airlines Flight 529, an Embraer EMB-120 Brasília, crashes in a field near Carrollton, Georgia in the United States, killing 10 of the 29 people on board.

• 1994 – Royal Air Maroc Flight 630, an ATR-42, is deliberately crashed into the Atlas Mountains, killing all 44 on board.

• 1989 – Unlimited class racer Rare Bear, a highly-modified Grumman F8F-2 Bearcat, sets a new piston-powered speed record of 850.24 kilometers per hour (528.32 miles per hour) at Las Vegas, Nevada.

• 1985 – Sir Freddie Laker accepts a £UK 8 million in a settlement with British Airways. Laker had sued twelve airlines for conspiring to drive Laker Airways out of business

• 1974 – First flight of the BAE Systems Hawk

• 1973 – First flight of the Aerosport Scamp

• 1967 – First flight of the Antonov An-30

• 1963 – An Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-124 ditches in the Neva river in Leningrad after engine failure; there were no fatalities among the 52 on board, but the aircraft is destroyed.

• 1961 – A Canadian Pacific Air Lines Douglas DC-8 sets two world records during a single test flight. First, it reaches 50,000 feet (15,240 m) at a weight of 107,600 pounds (48,807 kg), a new altitude record for a loaded transport jet. Then, in a dive from that altitude, it reaches Mach 1.012 with a true air speed of 662.5 mph (1,066.8 km/hr) at an altitude of 39,614 feet (12,074 m), becoming the first airliner to break the sound barrier.

• 1957 – The USAF formally cancels the XF-103 Mach 3 interceptor program

• 1956 – Flying a Vought F8U-1 Crusader fighter, U. S. Navy Commander R. W. “Duke” Windsor sets a U. S. national speed record over a 15 km (9.3 mi) course, averaging 1,015.428 mph (1,635.150 km/hr) at China Lake, California.

• 1954 – Col. Einar Axel Malmstrom, vice wing commander at Great Falls Air Force Base, Montana, is killed in the crash of a Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star trainer, 52-9630, near the base. Local citizens then urge the renaming of the facility in his honor. The base was renamed on 15 June 1956.

• 1953 – A new world’s altitude record of 83,235 feet is set by Marion Carl in the Douglas D-558-2 Skyrocket.

• 1953 – United Airlines Flight 615, a Douglas DC-6 B with FAA registration N37550, was operating as Flight 615, which was a transcontinental east-west service serving Boston-Hartford-Cleveland-Chicago-Oakland-San Francisco. The plane was transporting 50 persons (44 passengers and 6 crew members). The flight departed Chicago at 10:59 p. m. CST en route to Oakland. At around 4:16 a. m., the plane was approaching Oakland. At this time, the pilot, Marion W. Heddin of Los Altos, had talked with the control tower of the Civil Aeronautics Administration at the airport preparing for his landing, and had mentioned no trouble. At 4:25 a. m. Flight 615 was cleared for the straight-in approach into Oakland. This was the last radio transmission received from the flight. The plane crashed into mountainous terrain 15 miles (24 km) southeast of Oakland, careening into Tolman Peak and over its knoll, scattering on the downslope and into Dry Gulch Canyon below in a fiery explosion. All 50 persons on board perished.

• 1951 – A Lockheed T-33A-1-LO Shooting Star, 49-917, of the 5th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron, 52d Fighter-Interceptor Group, crashes on take off from McGuire Air Force Base into a scrub pine forest at adjacent Fort Dix, New Jersey, killing the two crew and spraying burning fuel over a group of 54 U.S. Army soldiers assigned to B battery of the Ninth division's 26th Field Artillery Battalion, wrapping up an army communications exercise, killing 11 and injuring 20. The trainer, unable to gain altitude, clips trees at the edge of a clearing and impacts 50 feet (15 m) from an army six-by-six troop carrier vehicle upon which some soldiers had already boarded. Others were lined up in formation close by. Eight died almost instantly and three succumbed later in hospital. All Army fatalities were 22 or younger, all hailed from New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut, and all had been in the army for less than five months. Also killed were pilot Capt. William H. Raub, (also reported as William H. Rauh ) 31, of Seattle, and his passenger, Maj. Theodore Deakyne, 30, of Levittown, New York. "It was an unfortunate tragedy -- a remarkable coincidence of circumstances which brought the plane to the spot where the men were on the verge of moving out. Thirty seconds later might have made a lot of difference," Lt. Bertram Brinley, Fort Dix public information officer, said.

• 1944 – Lieutenant John M. Armitage, USNR, is killed while conducting air firing tests of a Tiny Tim rocket at the Naval Ordnance Test Station at Inyokern, California. He flew into the ground from 1,500 ft (460 m). in an Curtiss SB2C-1C Helldiver, BuNo 018248, and was killed after the launching the rocket. Accident investigators discovered that the shock wave from the rocket's blast caused a jam in the SB2C's flight controls. Airfield dedicated 30 May 1945 in his honor as Armitage Field, now part of Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, California.

• 1944 – First flight of the Grumman F8F Bearcat.

• 1942 – Flying a Grumman F4F-4 Wildcat fighter, U. S. Marine Corps Captain John L. Smith scores the first aerial victory by a Henderson Field-based aircraft, shooting down a Mitsubishi A6M Zero between Lunga Point, Guadalcanal, and Savo Island.

• 1941 – 24 year-old Lt. Eugene M. Bradley of Antlers, Oklahoma, assigned to the 64th Pursuit Squadron. While piloting in a dogfight training drill, Lt. Bradley's P-40 crashed on August 21, 1941 at the Army Airfield, Windsor Locks, Connecticut. The airfield was renamed Army Air Base, Bradley Field, Connecticut on January 20, 1942 and is now Bradley International Airport.

• 1932 – 21-27 – 7,363 km race over Europe of the Challenge 1932 contest.

• 1927 – The first Canadian-built, modern, all metal, low wing monoplane, the Northrup Delta, was flown from the St Lawrence at Longueuil.

• 1923 – The first electric airway beacons start appearing at airfields in the United States to assist in night flying operations.

• 1918 – First flight of the Nieuport-Delage NiD 29

• 1908 – Wilbur Wright moves to Camp d’Auvours, 11 km (6.8 mi) east of Le Mans, where all his flights for the remainder of the year will be based.

• 1908 – The Antoinette II flies the first circle by a monoplane at Issy-les-Moulineaux. It lasts 1 min, 36 seconds.

August 22

• 2012 – A Brazilian Air Force AMX hit a bird.All the electrical system and the engine were damaged. The pilot successfully landed.

• 2011 – An American unmanned aerial vehicle strike in Pakistan conducted by the Central Intelligence Agency kills Atiyah Abd al-Rahman, a member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group and Ansar al-Sunna and former chief-of-staff to the deceased al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.[1]

• 2011 – The Government of Niger begins patrols by Niger Air Force aircraft over its border with Libya to avoid infiltration of Niger's territory by armed groups from Libya and the crossing of the border by mercenaries from the Sahel heading to Sabha, Libya, and to end the smuggling of military forces and resources out of Libya.[2]

• 2007 – UH-60L Black Hawk 06-27077 crashes in northern Iraq, killing all 14 U.S. soldiers. The military said initial indications showed the aircraft experienced a mechanical problem.[3][4][5][6]

• 2006 – Pulkovo Aviation Enterprise Flight 612, a Tupolev Tu-154, crashes near Donetsk, Ukraine, killing all 170 people on board.

• 2002 – First CH-149 Cormorant was delivered to the Canadian Forces.

• 2002 – A Twin Otter carrying 18 people, including tourists from Germany, the United States and Britain, crashed in Nepal, killing all aboard.

• 1999 – China Airlines Flight 642, a McDonnell Douglas MD-11, crashes on landing at Hong Kong International Airport during "Typhoon" Sam; of the 315 people on board, three die.

• 1997 – The crew of an Eglin Air Force Base General Dynamics F-16B Block 15L Fighting Falcon, 82-1037, of the 39th Flight Test Squadron, "ET" tailcode, ejected over the Gulf of Mexico after their jet suffered separation of engine fourth stage at speeds past Mach, about seven miles south of Destin, Florida. The airmen were rescued by the crew and passengers of Top Gun, a charter fishing boat out of Destin, who saw the crash. The airmen were members of the Eglin's Development Test Center's 39th Flight Test Squadron. The plane was returning to Eglin after flying as a chase plane in a mission with an Air Force McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle.Divers located the jet in 70 feet of water a week following the accident. A barge carried the wreckage to a hangar at Eglin where investigators hoped to find clues as to what caused the crash.

• 1989 – Alexander Yakovlev dies, aged 84

• 1985 – British Airtours Flight 28M, a Boeing 737, aborts its takeoff from Manchester, England because of an engine fire. While 82 passengers and crew escape alive, 55 are killed, most from smoke inhalation.

• 1981 – Far Eastern Air Transport Flight 103, a Boeing 737, disintegrates during flight and crashed near Taipei, Taiwan; severe corrosion in the fuselage structure leads to explosive decompression and disintegration at high altitude; all 110 on board are killed.

• 1980 – James Smith McDonnell, American aircraft manufacturer, dies. (b. 1899).

• 1974 – First flight of the Short 330

• 1973 – First flight of the Learjet 35

• 1973 – RAF McDonnell Douglas/Hawker Siddeley F-4M Phantom FGR.2, XV427, 'X', of 17 Squadron, RAF Brüggen, flies into high ground at Arfeld, Bad Berleburg, West Germany killing both crew. Aircraft had fallen out of a four ship formation during a turn and the pilot attempted to rejoin by ‘cutting a corner’ but impacted rising terrain.

• 1972 - First flight of the Sukhoi T-4

• 1970 – Two Sikorsky HH-53 C helicopters complete a non-stop transpacific flight of 9,000 miles (14,484 km) using in-flight refueling.

• 1966 – Second (of five) Ling-Temco-Vought XC-142As, 62-5922, returned to flight status on 23 July 1966 after wing replacement, is delivered to the U.S. Air Force at Edwards AFB, California for Cat II testing, but on this date during one the airframe's first flights at that base, a chip detector warning light for the number three propeller illuminates, so the engine is shut down and the prop feathered. Heavy braking during extended roll-out as a result of landing with the collective lever disengaged causes brake fires in the main gear pods. Damage takes until 2 September to repair.

• 1965 – Ellen Church, First American airline stewardess, dies. (b. 1904).

• 1963 – Joe Walker in the X-15 test plane reaches altitude of 106 km (67 miles).

• 1952 – First flight of the Saunders-Roe Princess

• 1951 – The aircraft carrier USS Essex (CV-9) joins Task Force 77 off the northeast coast of Korea. Embarked aboard Essex is Fighter Squadron 172 (VF-172), equipped with F2H-2 Banshee fighters. It is the first deployment of the Banshee to a war zone.

• 1951 – Bell X-1D, 48-1386, suffers fire/explosion internally while being carried aloft for its first flight, jettisoned from mothership, Boeing B-29-96-BO Superfortress, 45-21800, impacting on Rogers Dry Lakebed, Edwards AFB, California.

• 1944 – Operation Goodwood, a series of Royal Navy air strikes by the aircraft carriers HMS Formidable, HMS Furious, HMS Indefatigable, HMS Nabob, and HMS Trumpeter against the German battleship Tirpitz at her anchorage in Norway, begins with a day strike designated Goodwood I, which is foiled by heavy cloud cover over the target area. An evening strike, Goodwood II, also is unsuccessful, and Nabob is so badly damaged by a torpedo from the German submarine U-354 that she never again sees action.

• 1938 – The Civil Aeronautics Act becomes effective in the United States, coordinating all non-military aviation under the Civil Aeronautics Authority.

• 1932 – Gerald P. Carr, American astronaut was born. Col. Carr was the commander of Skylab 4, launched November 16, 1973, and concluded February 8, 1974. This was the longest manned flight (84 days, 1 h, 15 min) in the history of manned space exploration to that date.

• 1927 – A KLM Fokker F. VIII crashes near Sevenoaks, Kent due to structural failure of the tailfin, killing one of 11 on board.

• 1922 – First flight of the Vickers Victoria (serial no. J6869), a military transport, taking off from Brooklands, England with Stan Cockerell at the controls.

• 1918 – Lieutenant Frigyes Hefty of the Austro-Hungarian Air Corps successfully parachutes from his burning fighter after a dogfight with Italian aircraft. He is the first person to survive a combat parachute jump.

• 1914 – An Avro 504 on patrol over Belgium is shot down by German rifle fire, the first Royal Flying Corps aircraft destroyed in action.

• 1914 – An early attempt to get a Lewis gun into action in air-to-air combat fails when a Royal Flying Corps Farman armed with one scrambles to intercept a German Albatros and takes 30 min to climb to 1,000 feet (305 m) because of the gun’s weight. On landing, the pilot is ordered to remove the Lewis gun and carry a rifle on future missions.

• 1909 – The first great aviation meeting in Bétheny, France, opens as 23 European airplanes make 87 flights during one week. The meeting will have a strong influence on the technical and military aspects of flight.

August 23

• 2012 – The Syrian Air Force makes heavy strikes against rebel forces attacking Syrian government positions in Abu Kamal.[1]

• 2012 – Caught in a sudden thunderstorm, a hot-air balloon carrying tourists on a sighteeing trip attempts an emergency landing in Slovenia's Ljubljana Marshes, but strikes trees, crashes, and catches fire. Four of the 32 people on board are killed and the remainder are injured.

• 2009 – South East Asian Airlines Flight 014, a Dornier Do-328-100, registration RP-C6328, overruns the runway on landing at Ninoy Aquino International Airport, Philippines, and is substantially damaged, but is to be repaired.

• 2009 – Danish airline Wings of Bornholm commences operations.

• 2005 – TANS Perú Flight 204, a Boeing 737-200, crashes near Pucallpa, Peru. Forty of the 92 passengers on board, as well as four of the six crew members, perish.

• 2000 – Gulf Air Flight 072, an Airbus A320, crashes into the Persian Gulf off Manama, Bahrain while attempting to land. All 143 passengers and eight crew members are killed.

• 1993 – The Russian Air Force flies open skies missions over Luftwaffe bases

• 1990 – A new Air Force One, a modified Boeing 747-200 B, is delivered to the Air Force and President George H. W. Bush.

• 1990 – First flight of the Boeing VC-25

• 1983 – First flight of the Boeing Skyfox

• 1979 – Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17F, 002, of the USAF 4477th Test & Evaluation Squadron, Groom Lake, Nevada is lost due to pilot induced loss of control. Pilot Lt. M. Hugh Brown, USN, 31, of VX-4, "Bandit 12", originally of Roanoke, Virginia, enters spin while engaging adversary, U.S. Navy Northrop F-5 Freedom Fighter, recovers, but enters second spin too close to ground, irrecoverable, impacts at steep angle near Tonopah airfield boundary, killed instantly. No bail-out attempted.

• 1977 – Gossamer Condor became the first human-powered aeroplane, flying a figure-8 course to demonstrate sustained, controlled flight

• 1975 – An Grumman A-6E Intruder, BuNo 149948, 'AJ-500', of VA-35, and an McDonnell Douglas F-4J Phantom II from USS Nimitz collide in midair over the Atlantic Ocean during a refueling maneuver ~600 miles SSW of Scotland. A spokesman said that the two crew of the A-6 were missing and presumed dead while the two Marine crew of the F-4J were recovered. Missing are Lt. Garwood Bacon of Riverton, New Jersey, and Lt. Craig Renshaw of Middletown, Pennsylvania [disambiguation needed].

• 1965 – Air Wisconsin Airlines commences operations with its first flight between Appleton, Wisconsin and Chicago–O'Hare, Illinois.

• 1964 – Greek Air Force F-4 Phantoms are recalled while en route to attack Turkish military positions

• 1958 – President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the Federal Aviation Act of 1958, dissolving the Civil Aeronautics Administration and Civil Aeronautics Board and transferring all authority over aviation operations in the United States to the newly-created Federal Aviation Agency (FAA, later renamed Federal Aviation Administration).

• 1954 – First flight of the Lockheed C-130 Hercules. Lockheed engineering test pilots Stanley Beltz and Roy Wimmer flew it from the production plant in Burbank, California to Edwards Air Force Base.

• 1953 – First flight of the Short Seamew

• 1951 – The U. S. Navy announces that the McDonnell F2H Banshee is in action against communist forces in Korea. This marks the first time that McDonnell-built planes have engaged in combat operations.

• 1949 – BOAC commences its first services to the Far East to be flown entirely by landplanes.

• 1948 – On the first flight test of the McDonnell XF-85 Goblin parasite fighter, 45-524, (the second of two prototypes), McDonnell test pilot Edwin F. Schoch successfully detaches from trapeze carried on Boeing EB-29B Superfortress, 44-84111, named "Monstro", but when he tries to hook up after free flight, the small fighter, buffeted in turbulence from the bomber, swings violently forward, smashes canopy against the trapeze, knocking the pilot's helmet off. Schoch successfully belly lands on dry lakebed at Muroc Air Force Base, California, suffering little damage.

• 1947 – The Avro Tudor 2 prototype, G-AGSU, crashes on take-off at Woodford, Greater Manchester, killing Avro chief designer Roy Chapman and test pilot S. A. Thorn.

• 1944 – Maj. Carlo Emanuele Buscaglia, one of Italy's most noted aviators, crashes this date in a Martin Baltimore light bomber. After the armistice of 8 September 1943, Buscaglia was asked to fight alongside the Allies, as a member of the newly formed Aeronautica Cobelligerante del Sud. In the meantime, in the northern part of Italy still occupied by Germany, a wing of the Aeronautica Nazionale Reppublicana (the Air Force of the puppet Italian Social Republic) had also been named after him. On 15 July 1944 Buscaglia assumed command of the 28th Bomber Wing, equipped with Baltimores, based on Campo Vesuvio airport, near Naples. On 23 August, while attempting to fly one of the new planes during the early transition training phase, without an instructor, Buscaglia crashes on take-off, dying in hospital in Naples the following day.

• 1944 – Freckleton Air Disaster: A United States Army Air Force Consolidated B-24H-20-CF Liberator, 42-50291, "Classy Chassis II", during an unusually severe storm, crashes into a school at Freckleton, Lancashire, England at 1047 hrs. whilst on approach to Warton Aerodrome. Twenty adults, 38 children and the three-man crew are killed. In addition to a memorial in the village churchyard, a marker was placed at the site of the accident in 2007.

• 1943 – About 20 German Junkers Ju 88 bombers attack the harbor at Palermo, Sicily, damaging several ships.

• 1943 – (Overnight) Royal Air Force Bomber Command resumes the bombing of Berlin with a raid by 727 bombers. Poor target marking, poor timing by bombers, and the difficulty H2S navigation radar has in identifying landmarks in Berlin lead to wide scattering of bombs, although the Germans suffer nearly 900 casualties on the ground. For the first time, the Germans employ new Zahme Sau (“Tame Boar”) tactics – The use of ground-based guidance to direct night fighters into the British bomber stream, after which the night fighters operate independently against targets they find – And the British lose 56 bombers, the highest number so far in a single night and 7.9 percent of the participating aircraft.

• 1942 – Boeing B-17E-BO Flying Fortress, 41-9091, of the 427th Bomb Squadron, 303rd Bomb Group,[144] operating out of Biggs Field, El Paso, Texas, suffers center fuselage failure in extremely bad weather 12 miles W of Las Cruces, New Mexico, only the radio operator and the engineering officer for the 427th Bomb Squadron, both in the radio room, survive by parachuting. Pilot was James E. Hudson. The 303rd BG was due to deploy overseas from Biggs on 24 August.

• 1938 – The American racing and record-breaking pilot Frank Hawks is killed along with a passenger, J. Hazard Campbell, when his Gwinn Aircar becomes entangled in telephone lines shortly after taking off from East Aurora, New York.

• 1936 – Nationalist aircraft bomb the airport at Getafe, Spain.

• 1930 – Ford National Reliability Air Tour starts in Chicago.

• 1923 – The I-1 (Il-400), the first independent design from Nikolai Nikolayevich Polikarpov, makes its first flight. Polikarpov has worked at the RBVZ (Russko-Baltijskij Vagonnyj Zavod (Russo-Baltic Cart Works)) on the Ilya Muromets and later becomes chief engineer at the GAZ-1 plant.

• 1921 – The R38 class (also known as the A class) of rigid airships was designed for Britain’s Royal Navy during the final months of World War I, intended for long-range patrol duties over the North Sea. Four such airships were originally ordered by the Admiralty, but orders for three of them (R39, R40 and R41) were cancelled after the armistice with Germany and work on the lead ship of the class, R38, continued only after the United States Navy had agreed to purchase her. At the time of her first flight in 1921, she was the world’s largest airship.The American designation ZR-2 was already painted on the hull before its four completed test flights and in preparation for a final trial flight and delivery to Lakehurst. On 24 August 1921, ZR-2 was destroyed by a structural failure while in flight over the city of Hull and crashed into the Humber estuary, killing 44 out of the 49 crew aboard. This disaster resulted in more deaths than the more famous Hindenburg Disaster that killed 35.

• 1916 – The Brazilian Navy establishes a naval aviation arm with the creation of a naval aviation school.

• 1914 – Japan enters World War I, declaring war on Germany.

• 1913 – Léon Letort carries out the first non-stop flight between Paris and Berlin when he flies his Morane-Saulnier monoplane fitted with an 80-hp Le Rhône engine the 560 miles between the two capitals in 8 hours.

• 1878 – The British government uses its first military aviation budget (£150) to build and fly their first balloon, the Pioneer.

August 24

• 2010 – Henan Airlines Flight 8387, an Embraer E-190, overruns the runway and crashes at Yichun, Heilongjiang, northeast China, causing 43 fatalities from 91 passengers and 5 crew members; this is the first hull loss of an Embraer E-Jet.

• 2010 – Agni Air Flight 101, a Dornier Do 228, crashes outside of Kathmandu, Nepal in heavy rain, killing all 14 people on board.

• 2010 – Saudi Arabian airline SAMA ceases operations.

• 2010 – A Spanish Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon fighter crashed while attempting to take off at Moron Air Base. A Lieutenant Colonel of the Royal Saudi Air Force were killed while a Spanish Air Force Commander bailed out.

• 2009 – American Airlines retires its last Airbus A300 from scheduled service.

• 2008 – Iran Aseman Airlines Flight 6895, a Boeing 737, crashes just after take-off from Manas Airport in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. 68 of the 90 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 2004 – Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1303 and Siberia Airlines Flight 1047 explode south of Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow. The Russian government declares the explosions to have been caused by Chechen terrorists

• 2004 – A Venezuelan Air Force Shorts 360 crashes near Maracay, Venezuela, killing all 25 on board.

• 2001 – Air Transat Flight 236 runs out of fuel over the Atlantic Ocean and makes an emergency landing in the Azores. Upon landing some of the tires blow out, causing a fire that is extinguished by emergency personnel on the ground. None of the 304 people on board the Airbus A330-200 were seriously injured.

• 1999 – On board a Uni Air McDonnell Douglas DC-9 a fire starts in an overhead luggage compartment over Hualien Taiwan. The fire was cause by the accidental ignition fumes from a bottle of household cleaner. One person dies.

• 1998 – Myanma Airways Flight 635, a Fokker F-27 Friendship, crashes while on approach to Tachilek Airport; all 36 on board die.

• 1990 – Early in the build-up of forces in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, the U. S. Air Force has 222 fighters, ground-attack aircraft, and bombers deployed in and around Saudi Arabia.

• 1990 – A fatal aircraft accident involving a U.S. Coast Guard Grumman E-2C Hawkeye at the former Naval Station Roosevelt Roads in Puerto Rico prompted to the Coast Guard discontinue flying E-2Cs and to return all of its borrowed E-2s to the U.S. Navy.

• 1988 – Assembly of the first McDonnell Douglas C-17 begins at Douglas Aircraft facilities in Long Beach, Calif.

• 1983 – A Canadair Challenger 601 business jet arrives at London from Calgary, setting a world distance record for a business jet, at 4,364.2 miles (6,982 km).

• 1979 – A Stearman biplane, aircraft registration number N48784,[1][2] flew into electrical transmission lines that cross Lake Natoma at Mississippi Bar.[3][4][5] Jacquelyn Burnett,[6] a passenger in the biplane, was killed. The pilot, Stephen Francis Williams, was convicted of manslaughter.[7] His conviction marked the first time in United States history that a pilot was held criminally responsible for the death of a passenger. Williams had previously killed his own 12-year-old daughter, Patricia Anna Williams,[8] by attempting a takeoff in dense fog at the Salinas Municipal Airport.[9]

• 1977 – First flight of the Learjet 28

• 1970 – Two USAF Sikorsky HH-53 C helicopters complete a non-stop trans-Pacific crossing from Eglin AFB, Florida to Da Nang, South Vietnam, aided by refueling encounters with Lockheed C-130 tankers.

• 1965 – An American military C-130 Hercules aircraft carrying 71 passengers and crew crashes into Yau Tong Bay in Hong Kong shortly after takeoff. The plane is carrying U. S. military personnel, mostly U. S. Marines flying back to South Vietnam after leave during the Vietnam War. Thirteen people reportedly survive the crash.

• 1961 – Beginning this day through October 12, U. S. aviatrix Jacqueline Cochran, flying a Northrop T-38 Talon, sets a wide range of records for women (altitude of 56,072.8 ft., a distance of 1,492.39 mi., a 100-km (62.14 mi.) closed circuit speed record of 784.29 mph and 15-km (9.32 mi.) course speed of 844.2 mph).

• 1959 – Pan American World Airways inaugurates the first jetliner service between the continental United States and Hawaii, using Boeing 707 s.

• 1956 – A U. S. Army helicopter becomes the first rotary-winged aircraft to fly non-stop across the United States.

• 1954 – The pilot of an Republic F-84G Thunderjet dies at Eglin AFB following an ejection as the aircraft rolled to a stop after landing at Eglin Auxiliary Field 6. The Thunderjet was on a routine training mission.

• 1951 – United Airlines Flight 615, a Douglas DC-6 B, crashes near Decoto (now Union City, California), while on final approach to Oakland, California; all 44 passengers and 6 crew members die.

• 1950 – ATwo B-26 Invaders of the 729th Bombardment Squadron (Light), 452d Bombardment Group (Light), based at George AFB, California, collide in flight over El Mirage Dry Lake, 10 miles NW of Victorville, California. B-26B, 44-34174, c/n 27453, built as A-26B-45-DL, piloted by Ouris H. Cuerton, and B-26B, 44-34677, c/n 29956, built as A-26B-66-DL, piloted by Lyle N. Leavitt, both crash with crew fatalities during attempted bail-outs. The 729th/452d had been ordered to active service on 10 August 1950.

• 1948 – Two separate accidents kill 13 U.S. airmen, this date. Nine are killed aboard an Army Douglas C-117A-1-DK Skytrain, 45-2554, c/n 18557/34212, 45-2554, near Newton, New Jersey, after a mid-air collision with an Army North American B-25J-30-NC Mitchell, 44-86870. The bomber suffers damage to a wingtip but lands safely. In a separate accident, two C-47 Skytrains engaged in the Berlin Airlift collide in mid-air near Ravolzhausen, killing two crew on each airlifter. Killed in the C-47s were Maj. Edwin C. Diltz, Capt. William R. Howard, Capt. Joel M. DeVolentine, and 1st Lt. William T. Lucas. Capt. Howard was piloting C-47A-80-DL, 43-15116, while Capt. DeVolentine was flying C-47A-90-DL, 43-16036, c/n 20502.

• 1945 – Second (of two prototypes) McDonnell XFD-1 Phantom, BuNo 48236, is damaged in a belly landing.

• 1944 – Aircraft from the British aircraft carriers HMS Indomitable and HMS Victorious raid Sumatra, striking the cement works at Indaroeng and the harbor facilities and shipping at Emmahaven.

• 1944 – Goodwood III, the third airstrike of Operation Goodwood, is the most successful Goodwood raid. Thirty-three Fairey Barracudas attack Tirpitz, hitting her with a 500-lb (227-kg) bomb and a 1,600-lb (726-kg) bomb. The latter penetrates the armored deck and could have caused extensive damage or sunk the ship, but fails to explode.

• 1943 – P/O DF McRae and crew, flying a Vickers Wellington of No. 179 (RAF) Squadron, sank the German submarine U-134.

• 1942 – (24-25) The Battle of the Eastern Solomons takes place north of the Solomon Islands. It includes an aircraft carrier action on during which U. S. Navy carrier aircraft sink the Japanese aircraft carrier Ryūjō, while Japanese carrier aircraft heavily damage the U. S. aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CV-6).

• 1942 – (Overnight) 226 British bombers attack Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, but most of their bombs land well west of the city; 16 aircraft do not return, including five Pathfinders.

• 1940 – A German bomber crew bombs a residential area of south London, apparently in error.

• 1939 – The Royal Air Force forms the Advanced Air Striking Force. Initially consisting of 10 squadrons of Fairey Battle bombers, its mission is to deploy to France in the event of war with Germany and strike targets in Germany from French bases.

• 1937 – The Republicans launch an offensive against Nationalist in forces in Aragon, supported by about 200 aircraft; the opposing Nationalists have only 15 Heinkels. The Nationalists redeploy 20 Fiat CR.32 fighters commanded by the ace Joaquín García Morato, 20 Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 bombers, and 20 cargo aircraft from northern Spain to the area to bolster the defense.

• 1933 – First flight of the Blackburn Shark

• 1932 – Amelia Earhart is the first woman to fly across the United States non-stop (from Los Angeles to Newark, New Jersey).

• 1925 – First flight of the Supermarine S.4

• 1924 – The U. S. Navy light cruiser USS Richmond (CL-9) rescues the crew of an Italian flying boat that is forced down in the Arctic Ocean by bad weather.

• 1921 – The British airship R38 (ZR-2) due to be delivered to the United States Navy as the ZR-2, broke in two on a test flight near Hull, England, half falling to the ground in flames. 44 died, including British Air Commodore E.M. Maitland, Leader of Airships, and 16 Americans. Maxfield Field at NAS Lakehurst, New Jersey, named 6 January 1944 in honor of Commander Louis H. Maxfield, Naval Aviator No. 17, who lost his life in the R38 crash.

• 1918 – U.S Army Maj. William R. Ream becomes the first flight surgeon to die in an aircraft accident, at the Effingham, Illinois airport, out of Chanute Field, Illinois, when his aircraft stalls/spins and crashes.

August 25

• 2012 – Neil Armstrong – American astronaut, aerospace engineer, test pilot, and university professor, U.S. Navy pilot, and the first person to walk on the Moon – dies in Cincinnati, at the age of 82.
• 2012 – An Iranian Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Bell 214 crashed in the Western Iran killing all three crew and on soldier on board.
• 2011 – At Tripoli International Airport during the Battle of Tripoli, the Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A300B4-620 5A-IAY and the Libyan Arab Airlines Airbus A300B4-622 5A-DLZ are burned out and destroyed during fighting between government and rebel forces, and the Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A320 5A-ONK suffers substantial damage when an artillery shell hits its fuselage, setting it afire as well.[1][2][3] Some reports mention an additional two aircraft destroyed, including an Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A330.[4]
• 2010 – Passaredo Transportes Aéreos Flight 2231, operated by Embraer E-145 PR-PSJ, lands short of the runway at Vitória da Conquista Airport and is substantially damaged but all 27 people on board survive.[5]
• 2010 – Iran Aseman Airlines Flight 773, operated by a Fokker 100, overruns the runway on landing at Tabriz International Airport. The aircraft is substantially damaged.[6]
• 2010 – The 2010 Bandundu Filair Let L-410 crash on approach to Bandundu Airport, Democratic Republic of the Congo, kills all but one of the 21 on board.
• 2006 – Rollout of the first Block 20 RQ-4 Global Hawk at Northrop Grumman’s Plant 42 manufacturing facility in Palmdale, California.
• 2000 – RAF BAE Systems Hawk T.1, XX266, of the Red Arrows demonstration team suffers birdstrike while returning to Exeter from a display at Dartmouth, Devon, ~17 miles (27 km.) SW of Exeter, punching large hole in starboard wing. Aircraft made safe landing at Exeter Airport.
• 1995 – First flight of the Airbus A319
• 1990 – The United States Marine Corps‘ 7th Marine Expeditionary Brigade has deployed 124 aircraft to Saudi Arabia. The U. S. Air Force’s Military Airlift Command has flown 259 sorties in support of the brigade’s deployment.
• 1988 – First flight of the FFV Aerotech BA-14 Starling
• 1985 – Bar Harbor Airlines Flight 1808, a Beech BE-99, crashes near Auburn, Maine, killing all 8 people on board, including Samantha Smith and her father.
• 1977 – AA USAF McDonnell-Douglas RF-4C Phantom II (66-0424) from RAF Alconbury crashed in a field at Thuine, Germany. Both crew perished and Capt. Alan Aertker, WSO is credited with remaining with the aircraft rather than ejecting to avoid devastation of the village. No civilians were injured or killed in the crash and citizens of Thuine erected a monument near the crash site.
• 1976 – The British Airways Concorde registered G-BOAD makes her maiden flight out of Filton, England. Today she is on display at the USS Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York.
• 1970 – A Lockheed TF-104G Starfighter, 27+30, c/n 5732, of MFG 1, Marineflieger, downed by engine failure due to FOD, shortly after take-off from Jagel Air Base at Glücksburg in northern West Germany, both crew ejecting safely. Although the cause of the crash was not immediately known, a spokesman said it might have been struck by a bird in flight. This was the 122nd West German Starfighter crash since the type entered service in 1961.
• 1965 – First Curtiss-Wright X-19A prototype, 62-12197, was destroyed in a crash at the FAA's National Aviation Facilities Experimental Center, Caldwell, New Jersey, (formerly NAS Atlantic City), when gearbox fails followed by loss of propellers at 0718:44 hrs EDT. Test pilot James V. Ryan and FAA copilot Hughes ejected in North American LW-2B seats as the now-ballistic airframe rolled inverted at 390 feet, chutes fully deployed in 2 seconds at ~230 feet. Elapsed time between prop separation and ejection was 2.5 seconds. Airframe impacted in dried out tidewater area after completing 3/4 of a roll at 0719. Crew suffers minor injuries from ejection through canopy. The program was subsequently cancelled. This will be the last airframe design from two of the most famous company names in aviation. Second prototype, reported in some sources to have been scrapped, survives at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Maryland, and is later recovered by the National Museum of the United States Air Force for preservation.
• 1955 – First flight of the Handley Page Dart Herald
• 1955 – Vought F7U-3 Cutlass, BuNo 129585, of VF-124, suffers collapsed starboard main landing gear during a hard landing aboard USS Hancock while she was operating in the vicinity of Hawaii.
• 1951 – For the first time in the Korean War, U. S. Navy fighters escort U. S. Air Force B-29 Superfortress bombers as F9 F Panthers of Fighter Squadron 51 (VF-51) and F2 H-2 Banshees of Fighter Squadron 172 (VF-172) from the aircraft carrier USS Essex (CV-9) cover B-29 s on a raid on Rashin, Korea. They encounter no enemy aircraft.
• 1950 – ARAF Douglas Dakota C.4, KN630, of No. 52 Squadron crashes in dense jungle near Kampong Jenera during a target making and supply dropping mission, 12 dead. Nine Britons, along with three Malaysians onboard, are killed when the Dakota crashes into a ravine near Kampung Jendera, in the Sungai Beluar valley in the communist-infested jungles of Gua Musang, Kelantan. The Britons who perished were identified as RAF crew pilot Lt Edward Robert Talbot, 27, from Dorchester; navigator Sgt Geoffrey Carpenter, 23, from West Norwood; and signaller Sgt Thomas O'Toole, 34, from Merthyr Tydfil. The Royal Army Service Corps air despatchers were Corporal Phillip Bryant, 25, from Southend-on-Sea; and Privates Peter Taylor, 20, from Bournemouth; Roy Wilson, 21, from Birkenhead and Oliver Goldsmith, 21, from Neston - all drivers. The passengers were army officer Major John Proctor and land development officer Anker Rentse. The Malaysians were police constable Mohammed Abdul Lalil Jalil, civilian Yaacob Mat and an Orang Asli guide, Saiap Alais Sherda, from the Sakai tribe. RAF records showed the plane, based in Changi, Singapore, had flown to Kota Baru with three crew and four despatchers. In Kota Baru, the aircraft picked up the five passengers and flew east of Kampung Jendera to drop a marker flare at a clearing for eight Lincoln bombers. "The aircraft made a second low-level pass to drop another marker flare when it is believed that it suffered engine trouble due to the adverse weather condition, making it unable to clear a ridge. It then rammed into trees and crashed into a ravine, killing all aboard. The crash happened when the country was struggling with communist insurgents, a period known as the Malayan Emergency (1948-60), when British, Commonwealth and other security forces in Malaya fought the insurgents. The Communist Party of Malaya had demanded Malaya's independence, but Britain responded by mounting a large-scale military and political counter-insurgency operation. Malaya finally won Independence on Aug 31, 1957." On 15 March 2012, the remains of the crew were reburied at the Commonwealth War Grave in Cheras with full military honours in the presence of both British and Malaysian Defence Ministry officials, and members of the Ex-British Army Association of Malaysia.
• 1947 – The first Douglas D-558-1 Skystreak, Bu. No. 37970, flown by Major Marion E. Carl, U.S. Marine Corps, set a world speed record of 650.797 mph (1,047.356 km/h) over a 3-kilometer straight course at Muroc Army Air Field, California. This exceeded the record set by Commander Turner F. Caldwell, Jr., U.S. Navy, flying the same aircraft five days earlier, by 10.053 mph (16.178 km/h) (FAI Record File Number 9865)
• 1945 – A U. S. Army Air Forces P-38 Lightning fighter piloted by Colonel Clay Tice becomes the first American aircraft to land in Japan following the armistice of August 15.
• 1942 – U. S. Marine Corps SBD Dauntless dive bombers conduct the first bombing raid by Henderson Field-based aircraft, attacking Japanese shipping approaching Guadalcanal.
• 1942 – The Prince George, Duke of Kent (George Edward Alexander Edmund; 20 December 1902 - 25 August 1942) is killed while a passenger on a Short Sunderland Mk. III flying boat, W4026, 'DQ-M', of 228 Squadron. Thirteen of 14 on board killed including the Duke of Kent, three members of his staff, pilot Flt. Lt. Frank Goyen, Wing Cmdr. Moseley, and six other crew. Tail gunner Sgt. Andrew Jack was thrown clear of the wreckage in his turret, suffering burns and other injuries. The plane was en route from Evanton, Rosshire to Iceland, and then on to Newfoundland. The four-engined Sunderland struck Eagle's Rock near Ben Morven but the accident was never fully explained and several conspiracy theories have been circulated regarding the accident and Prince George's mission. Sole survivor Jack refused to discuss the accident throughout his life, fuelling the conspiracies.
• 1940 – 25-26 – Britain makes its first air raid on Berlin of the war.
• 1936 – Nationalist aircraft bomb Cuatro Vientos Airport in Madrid, Spain.
• 1932 – Amelia Earhart makes the first transcontinental flight across the US by a woman. She flies a Lockheed Vega.
• 1930 – Eddie August Schneider sets the junior transcontinental air speed record. He flew from Westfield, New Jersey
• 1928 – The crash of a B. C. Airways Ford Trimotor in Puget Sound, Washington, during bad weather kills seven people and is called Canada’s first major air disaster.
• 1922 – Captain Norman MacMillan and cine-photographer Geoffrey Mallins are rescued from the Bay of Bengal when their round-the-world attempt in a civilianised Fairey IIIC is thwarted by engine failure.
• 1919 – The first daily international flights begin, with the Aircraft Transport and Travel company flying a de Havilland DH.16 between London (Hounslow Heath Aerodrome) and Paris – Le Bourget Airport.
• 1917 – One of four Vickers F.B.26 Vampire, B1484, piloted by Vickers test pilot Harold Barnwell, crashes at Joyce Green, when he attempts a spin without sufficient altitude for recovery. Pilot KWF.
• 1914 – Pyotr N. Nesterov is first pilot to down an enemy aircraft in aerial combat when he rams an Austro-Hungarian plane flown by Baron von Rosenthal.
• 1912 – Royal Navy aviator Wilfred Parke becomes the first pilot ever to recover from a spin, regaining control of his Avro Type G biplane 50 feet from the ground at Larkhill, England.
• 1784 – The son of a Scottish minister, James Tytler, makes the first manned balloon hop in England when his hot-air device makes a brief uncontrolled ascent with Tytler in the basket to an altitude of a few hundred feet.

August 26

• 2012 – Syrian rebels claim to have shot down a Syrian government attack helicopter, possibly a Mil Mi-24 (NATO reporting name "Hind").[1]

• 2012 – After a final flight from Denver, Colorado, to Lihue, Kaua'i, Hawaii, 83-year-old Ron Akana retires as the longest-serving flight attendant in history. His career, all with United Airlines, had spanned 63 years since he joined the airline in 1949, interrupted only by two years of military service from 1951 to 1953. He had flown about 200 million miles (322,000,000 km) and made about 10,000 trips over the Pacific Ocean.[2][3]

• 2009 – Aéro-Frêt Antonov An-12 crash: TN-AIA, an Antonov An-12 operated by of Aéro-Frêt, suffers an in-flight fire, breaks up in mid-air and crashes at Brazzaville, Democratic Republic of the Congo. All six people on board are killed.

• 2008 – A Sun Air 737-200 carrying 109 passengers and crew is hijacked after takeoff of a flight from Nyala, Sudan to Cairo, and demand to be flown to France. The plane ends up landing in Libya, where the passengers would be released the next day later and the hijackers would surrender two days later.

• 2007 – In Kongolo, Tanganyika District, DRC 13 of 15 aboard die when an overloaded Antonov An-32 (reg 9Q-CAC) owned by Agefreco Air and operated by Great Lakes Business Company crashes while flying tin ore (Cassiterite)

• 2004 – Boeing delivers the 500th AH-64D Apache Longbow multirole combat helicopter.

• 2003 – Colgan Air Flight 9446, a US Airways Express Beechcraft 1900D on a repositioning flight with no passengers aboard, crashes in the water off Yarmouth, Massachusetts, immediately after takeoff from Barnstable Municipal Airport in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, due to a maintenance error. The two-man crew captain Scott Knabe (39) and first officer Steven Dean (38) dies.The NTSB identified the cause as aircraft manufacturer's erroneous depiction of the elevator trim drum in the maintenance manual and the flight crew's failure to follow the checklist procedures checking trimmers prior to take off having contributed to the accident.

• 2003 – The Columbia Accident Investigation Board releases its final report on Space Shuttle Columbia disaster.

• 2002 – First flight of the Eclipse 500

• 1988 – Mehran Karimi Nasseri begins what would be an 18 year layover in Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris. Believed to be the inspiration for the Steven Spielberg/Tom Hanks film The Terminal, a chain of immigration bureaucracy and paperwork snafus prevent Nasseri from leaving the airport while en route to settle in London. Despite assistance from lawyers, he would not be able to legally leave the airport until sickness forces him out in July of 2006.

• 1986 – The CFM56 turbofan is flight tested for the first time..

• 1985 – TWA is purchased by Carl Icahn and associates

• 1982 – Southwest Air Lines Flight 611, a Boeing 737-200, overruns the runway while landing at Ishigaki Airport in Japan. There are no fatalties, but 67 of the 138 on board are injured.

• 1975 – First flight of the McDonnell Douglas YC-15

• 1975 – LTV A-7D-12-CV Corsair II, 72-0172, of the 76th Tactical Fighter Squadron, 23rd Tactical Fighter Wing, England AFB, Louisiana, crashes on a test range on the eastern area of the Eglin AFB, Florida, reservation at ~2240 hrs. during a night training mission. The aircraft, part of a three-ship flight, had departed England AFB at ~2015 hrs. for a ground attack simulation at Eglin. The A-7D went down while orbiting the range with the other two aircraft of the flight. Pilot Capt. William N. Clark, 33, of Little Rock, Arkansas, is KWF. "The cause of the crash is unknown at this time but is being investigated by a board of qualified officers," Maj. Les Smith, Eglin Information officer, said. The three jets were slated to return to England AFB directly after completing the mission, Smith said. Capt. Clark is survived by his wife and three children who reside at England AFB.

• 1969 – First flight of the Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner

• 1959 – French flyer Jacqueline Auriol, piloting the Mirage III, becomes the first woman to attain the speed of Mach 2.

• 1959 – The White House enters the jet age. After pressure from Secretary of State John Dulles (after whom the Capitol’s airport is now named) regarding the somewhat shoddy appearance of a US President arriving at international meetings aboard a prop while Russian dignitaries flew in aboard jets, the first VC-137 A, a modified Boeing 707-120 airliner, enters service to replace the Lockheed Super Constellation formerly responsible for Presidential transport. Newer aircraft would subsequently take over President-carrying duties over the years, but this first jet, branded SAM 970, would remain in the Air Force’s Special Air Missions fleet untl 1996, last being used to transport Vice President Al Gore. SAM 970 is now on display at the Museum of Flight in Seattle.

• 1954 – Top Korean War USAF ace Capt. Joseph C. McConnell (16 victories) is killed in crash of fifth production North American F-86H Sabre, 52-1981, at Edwards AFB, California.

• 1953 – U.S. Coast Guard Boeing PB-1G Flying Fortress, BuNo 77253, ex-44-85827, loses brakes while landing at NAS Sand Point, near Seattle, Washington, overruns runway, crushes nose as it ends up in Lake Washington. Retrieved and sold for salvage.

• 1951 – Handley Page HP.88, VX330, a two-fifths scale flying testbed for the Handley Page HP.80 Victor bomber to prove crescent wing design, breaks up in flight when the rear fuselage separates during a manoeuvre. During a high-speed, low-level pass over Stansted's main runway, it suffered a failure of its slab-type tailplane's servo-control system, producing severe oscillations that subjected the airframe to excessive G-forces, causing the ship to break up, killing pilot D. J. P. Broomfield.

• 1944 – First flight of the Martin AM Mauler

• 1942 – Adolf Hitler orders the incomplete heavy cruiser Seydlitz to be completed as an aircraft carrier.

• 1940 – No. 1 (Fighter) Squadron engaged the enemy in the Battle of Britain and destroyed three and damaged four enemy aircraft. F/O RL Edwards was the RCAF’s first battle casualty.

• 1939 – The Messerschmitt Me 209 sets a new world speed record of 755 km/h (469 mph).

• 1937 – Majorca-based Italian aircraft bomb a British merchant ship off Barcelona, Spain.

• 1929 – The first flight of the largest trimotor transport aircraft built by Fokker, the F.IX, takes to the air on its first flight. The prototype (PH-AGA) was handed over to KLM on May 8, 1930, and given the name Adelaar (Eagle).

• 1925 – In a record that would stand until Feb. 24, 1983, Farman Parker of Anderson, Indiana becomes the world’s youngest pilot to fly solo. Born on January 9, 1912, he flies at the age of 13 years, 7 months, 17 days.

• 1927 – Bert Hinkler sets a new non-stop distance record, flying from Croydon, England to Riga, Latvia.

• 1909 – The Antoinette IV airplane sets a world distance record, flying 154.6 km (96.1 mi) in 2 hours 17 min 21 seconds.

August 27

• 2009 – Chinese airline East Star Air declares bankruptcy.
• 2009 – Russian airline Avianova begins operations.
• 2009 – T-906, an Ilyushin Il-76TD, of the National Air Force of Angola runs off the runway at Quatro de Fevereiro Airport, Angola, and is substantially damaged. One of the 41 people on board is injured.
• 2009 – A Hellenic Air Force PZL-Mielec M-18 Dromader fire-fighting aircraft from the 359 Public Services Air Support Unit based at Andravida Airforce Base crashes after hitting high-voltage cables. The accident occurred while fighting a forest fire in the village of Katseli near Argostoli, Kefalonia, Greece resulting in the death of the pilot.
• 2006 – The Boeing 737-900ER/9GP, is unveiled, with the first operator being Lion Air.
• 2006 – Comair Flight 5191, a Bombardier Canadair CRJ-100, crashes during takeoff near Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49 of the 50 people on board.
• 1990 – Death of Stevie Ray Vaughan: Blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and all four other people on board die in the crash of a Bell 206B JetRanger III helicopter near East Troy, Wisconsin.The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles.The helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that pilot Jeff Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter.
• 1990 – First flight of the Northrop YF-23
• 1985 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-51-I at 10:58:01 UTC. Mission highlights: Multiple comsat deployments, rescue of Syncom F3 (Leasat-3) by Astronauts.
• 1976 – First flight of the PZL-Mielec M-18 Dromader
• 1957 – A Royal Canadian Navy McDonnell F2H-3 Banshee fighter jet, BuNo 126306, Sqn. No. 103 of VF-870, collides on a runway with an RCN General Motors TBM-3E Avenger, BuNo 53358, of squadron VC-921, at naval air station HMCS Shearwater, Nova Scotia, Canada. A flight of 3 Avengers was cleared for a formation takeoff on Runway 20 while the Banshee was performing touch-and-go landings on intersecting Runway 16. Due to an inoperable radio, Lt. Ed Trzcinski, Banshee pilot and U.S. Navy exchange officer, did not hear instructions from the control tower to go around, and apparently did not see red flares launched from the control tower due to patchy fog over the airfield and a possible lack of situational awareness. The Banshee collided with the second Avenger, killing Trzcinski and SubLt. Julian Freeman, RCN, pilot and sole occupant of the Avenger.
• 1956 – Eighth of 13 North American X-10s, GM-52-1, c/n 8, on Navaho X-10 flight number 24, out of Cape Canaveral, Florida, a full-range test with final dive maneuver. Final flight of vehicle eight after three successful recovered missions. During takeoff the vehicle goes aloft, then settles back to the runway with its brakes locked. The tires burst, the gear fails, the gear doors come in contact with the runway, carving grooves in the pavement as they retract. Then, astonishingly, the vehicle rises from the runway, completes a successful full-range supersonic flight with terminal dive into the waters off Grand Bahamas.
• 1953 – Nos. 414, 422 and 444 Squadrons, comprising No. 4 Fighter Wing, flew from Canada to their new base at Baden Soellingen, Germany.
• 1950 – P-51 Mustangs of No. 2 Squadron SAAF are sent to Korea as part of South Africa's contribution to the war.
• 1942 – (Overnight) 306 British bombers attack Kassel, Germany, with the loss of 31 aircraft, a disturbingly high loss rate of 10.1 percent. However, the Pathfinders are more effective and the sky over Kassel is clear, and the raid is moderately successful.
• 1941 – The German submarine U-570 surrenders to a Royal Air Force Lockheed Hudson patrol bomber 80 nautical miles (148 km) south of Iceland. No other German submarine surrenders to enemy forces during World War II prior to the final days of the war.
• 1941 – Four Boulton Paul Defiants of 256 Squadron on practice formation flight, on NE heading a little W of Blackpool at 2,000 feet (610 m), break formation - right into a trio of Blackburn Bothas of 3 School of General Reconnaissance, flying NW at 1,500 feet (460 m). First two Defiants avoid Bothas, but third off the break, N1745, 'J-TP', strikes one Botha, L6509, cutting it in two, and losing one of its own wings. Botha comes down on ticket office of the Central Railway Station, setting large petrol-fed fire. Defiant impacts on private home at No. 97 Reads Avenue. Thirteen killed outright, including all four aircrew, 39 others injured. Of 17 detained in hospital, five later died. All civilian casualties were visitors to the seaside resort, except for one occupant of the house on Reads Avenue. This accident caused more casualties than all the enemy air raids on Blackpool and Fylde during the entire war
• 1940 – First flight of the Caproni Campini N.1
• 1939 – First flight of the Heinkel He 178
• 1936 – (27-29) German Junkers Ju 52 s supporting the Nationalists bomb Madrid. They damage the Ministry of War on August 29. It is the first terror bombing of a large city since World War I.
• 1926 – Commander John Rodgers, Naval Aviator No. 2, Assistant Chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics, on a flight from NAS Anacostia, Washington, D.C., crashes in the Delaware River near the Naval Aircraft Factory dock, Philadelphia, when his aircraft suddenly nose-dives and receives injuries from which he dies on the same day.
• 1923 – An Air Union Farman F.60 Goliath crashes near East Malling, Kent due to engine failure and panic among the passengers, killing one of 13 on board.
• 1918 – John D. Ryan became the first Director of the United States Army Air Service when he was appointed 28 Aug 1918, though the position was not officially created until March 1919.[1]
• 1916 – Oswald Boelcke creates the first German special fighter squadron Jagdstaffel 2 (or Jasta 2).
• 1914 – The Royal Naval Air Service’s famed Eastchurch Squadron arrives in France for World War I service, commanded by Wing Commander Charles Samson.
• 1913 – Lieutenant Petr Nesterov of the Russian Army in Kiev performs the first loop-the-loop. The complete circle and other intentional acrobatic stunts prove to be valuable experience for the wartime maneuvers needed during aerial battles.
• 1910 – Frederick Baldwin and John Alexander Douglas McCurdy, using a Curtiss biplane and an H. M. Horton wireless set, are the first pilots to send radio messages to the ground at Sheepshead, New York.
• 1783, flight of an unmanned experimental hydrogen-balloon in Paris (built by Professor Charles and the brothers Roberts). It flies 25 kilometres (16 mi) from Paris to Gonesse and is destroyed by frightened peasants.

August 28

• 2009 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-128 at 23:59 EDT. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 17A: MPLM Leonardo & 6 person ISS crew.

• 2008 – Zoom Airlines ceases operations due to financial struggles.

• 2003 – CH-47D Chinook 88-0098 from F Company/159th Aviation Brigade written off in Iraq.[1]

• 1993 – 76 die in an airplane crash in Tajikistan. The plane, a Yak-40 crashed while taking off in Khorog for a flight to the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, 160 miles to northwest.

• 1988 – Ramstein airshow disaster: Three of the ten Aermacchi MB-339PAN jets from the Italian Air Force display team Frecce Tricolori collide in mid-air in front of the audience while performing their 'pierced heart' formation. One aircraft crashes directly into the crowd. Sixty-seven spectators and all three pilots are killed and 346 seriously injured in the resulting explosion and fire.

• 1988 – First flight of the Hoffmann H-40

• 1980 – (28-31) The 3rd FAI World Rally Flying Championship is held in Aschaffenburg, West Germany. Individual winners are 1. Witold Świadek / Andrzej Korzeniowski (Poland), 2. Otto Höfling / Michael Amtmann (West Germany), 3. Luckerbauer / Meszaros (Austria). Team results are 1. Poland, 2. West Germany, 3. Austria.

• 1972 – Prince William of Gloucester is killed in the crash of a Piper Cherokee Arrow during the Gordonwood Trophy race.

• 1972 – Cpt Richard Richie becomes the first US Air Force ace of the Vietnam War.

• 1972 – Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou transport aircraft registration A4-233 carrying three crew and 26 passengers crashed in a remote valley south of the town of Wau in Papua New Guinea. The wreckage of the aircraft was located on 31 August following an extensive search by military and civilian aircraft. Five of the passengers survived the crash but one of them died shortly after being rescued.

• 1968 – McDonnell Douglas completes the 3,000th F-4 Phantom II.

• 1966 – The Soviet Union announces that it is training North Vietnamese Air Force pilots.

• 1963 – Two Boeing KC-135A-BN Stratotankers, 61-0319, c/n 18226, and 61-0322, c/n 18229, assigned with the 19th Bomb Wing, collide over the Atlantic between Bermuda and Nassau, all eleven crew aboard the two jets lost (6 on 0319 and 5 on 0322). Debris and oil slicks found ~750 miles ENE of Miami, Florida. Aircraft were returning to Homestead AFB, Florida after mission to refuel two Boeing B-47 Stratojets from Schilling AFB, Kansas (both of which landed safely) when contact with them was lost. Search suspended Monday night, 2 September 1963, when wreckage recovered by the Air Rescue Service is positively identified as being from the missing tankers.

• 1962 – While on an intermediate stop during a ferry flight to Moscow for acceptance testing, Kamov Ka-22, 0I-01, rolled to the left and crashed inverted, killing the entire crew. The cause was found to be the rotor linkage, and further inspection found that two of the other three Ka-22s suffered from the same defect. Subsequently, in order to improve stability and control, a complex differential autopilot was installed. This sensed attitude and angular accelerations, and fed into the control system.

• 1961 – In Operation Sageburner, a United States Navy McDonnell F4H-1F Phantom II fighter, Bu. No. 145307, flown by Lieutenants Huntington Hardisty and Earl De Esch, set a world speed record, averaging 1,452.777 kilometers per hour (902.714 miles per hour) over a 3-kilometer (1.864-mile) course while flying below 125 feet (38.1 m) at all times.

• 1958 – First flight of the Beechcraft Queen Air, an American twin-engined light aircraft evolution of the Model 65 with a more modern swept tail and more powerful engines.

• 1957 – A rocket-boosted English Electric Canberra sets a new world altitude record of 70,308 ft (21,430 m)

• 1952 – A F6F Hellcat is loaded with explosives and flown as a remote-controlled drone against a railway bridge at Hungnam

• 1947 – The Kvitbjørn disaster: A Norwegian Air Lines Short S.25 Sandringham 6 flying boat Kvitbjørn crashes into a mountain near Lødingsfjellet in Lødingen, Norway, killing all 35 people on board. It is the deadliest aviation accident in Norwegian history at the time.

• 1945 – Consolidated Consolidated B-32 Dominator, 42-108528, of the 386th BS, 312th BG, crashed east of Amaro-O-Shima in the Ryukus after engine failure. 11 of 13 aboard survived. One of the last operational missions of World War II. Also, this date, Consolidated B-32 Dominator, 42-108544, written off when it lost an engine on takeoff from Yontan Airfield, Okinawa. Skidded off runway, exploded, and burned. 13 KIA

• 1942 – No. 129 (fighter) Squadron was formed at Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.

• 1942 – (Overnight) A raid by 159 British bombers against Nuremberg, Germany, suffers an even higher loss rate of 14.5 percent as 23 aircraft fail to return, although the raid again is moderately successful. “Red Blob, ” Bomber Command’s first target indicator, is used to mark the target for the first time, glowing a distinctive red.

• 1934 – Aug 28-Sept 16 – The fourth International Tourist Aircraft Contest Challenge 1934 in Warsaw, won by the Polish crew of Jerzy Bajan on the RWD-9 plane.

• 1928 – Famed bush pilot Clennell (Punch) Dickins leaves on his 12-day survey of the eastern Arctic. He covers 6,336 km in 37 hours of flying; he often navigates by the sun.

• 1923 – United States Army Air Service Lieutenant John Richter and Lowell Smith establish a new endurance record of 37 hours 15 min in an Airco DH.4, covering 3,293 miles (5,299 km). They are refueled fifteen times during the flight.

• 1919 – The International Air Traffic Association (IATA) is formed at The Hague, Holland.

• 1910 – Armand Dufaux pilots a Dufaux 4 biplane 66 km (41 mi) from St. Gingolph to Geneva at an altitude of around 150 m (500 ft), taking 56 min and 5 seconds for the crossing of Lake Geneva, the longest flight over “open water” at the time.

• 1908 – The US Army accepts its first dirigible. It is 96 feet long, with a 20-hp Curtiss engine.

August 29

• 2012 – A United States Marine Corps Bell UH-1Y of HMLA-469 crashed in Helamand province, Afghanistan killing two soldiers from the 2nd Australian Commando Regiment.

• 2012 – Syrian rebels claim to have attacked a Syrian government military air base in Taftanaz, Syria, damaging several government helicopters.[1]

• 2009 – A United States Air Force Boeing E-3 Sentry catches fire on landing at Nellis Air Force Base, United States. All 32 people on board are safely evacuated.

• 2007 – Airmen at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota load six nuclear-tipped AGM-129 ACM cruise missiles onto a B-52H bomber for transport to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana without ensuring that the nuclear warheads had been replaced with training warheads. The nukes shoot the breeze without proper handling or security precautions in place for a full 36 hours before anyone notices. The Pentagon would classify it as a “Bent Spear” event, four USAF commanders would lose their jobs and many other airmen would be disciplined.

• 2005 – Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport (MSY) is impacted by Hurricane Katrina, but suffering no flooding. The airport would reopen to supply and rescue flights by the following day, with commercial cargo flights resuming September 10th and passenger flights restarting on September 13th.

• 2005 – An OH-58D(I) Kiowa 90-0037 from 4th Squadron, 3d ACR crashes in Iraq.[2]

• 2001 – Binter Mediterráneo Flight 8261, a CASA CN-235, suffers port engine failure and crashes onto the N-340 road while attempting to make an emergency landing at Ruiz Picasso International Airport, killing 4 of 43 on board, the pilot initially survives, but dies several hours later.

• 1998 – A Cubana de Aviación Tupolev Tu-154 crashed during takeoff into buildings in Quito, Ecuador. Seventy-five of the 90 people on board died as well as 10 on the ground.

• 1996 – Vnukovo Airlines Flight 2801, a Tupolev Tu-154, crashes into a mountain on Spitsbergen, an island in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, killing all 141 on board.

• 1984 – Second prototype Rockwell B-1A Lancer, 74-0159, of the Air Force Flight Test Center, Edwards AFB, California, crashes 22 miles NE of the base, in the desert E of Boron, California, when control is lost during an aft centre of gravity test. The flight commander, Rockwell test pilot Doug A. Benefield, is killed when escape pod parachutes fail to fully deploy, module impacting in a right nose low attitude. The Co-pilot and flight test engineer are badly injured.

• 1978 – First flight of the Hawker 400

• 1970 – First flight of the McDonnell Douglas DC-10

• 1969 – In the TWA Flight 840 hijacking, two operatives from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine force a Boeing 707 to land at Damascus, Syria; all passengers were released except for two passengers who were released two months later; there are no casualties to the 127 on board, but the aircraft's nose section is blown up.

• 1964 – First flight of the Piaggio PD.808

• 1961 – A French military aircraft clips a cable of the aerial tramway connecting Pointe Helbronner and the Aiguille du Midi in the French Alps. Three cars of the tramway fall, killing five people. The pilot lands his plane safely.

• 1959 – Chris Hadfield, first Canadian to walk in space, was born.

• 1958 – United States Air Force Academy opens in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

• 1956 – RCAF Sabre-5 flew 2740 miles in 5 hours and 30 seconds (Vancouver-Gimli-Halifax) with F/Lt Ralph Annis and F/O Chick Childerhose.

• 1955 – An English Electric Canberra sets a new altitude record of 65,876 ft (20,079 m)

• 1952 – Boulton Paul P.120, VT951, first flown 6 August 1952, crashes this date on Salisbury Plain, Wilts, Great Britain after control failure, tail flutter. Pilot A.E. "Ben" Gunn ejects safely. Airframe had accumulated only ~eleven hours flying time. This is the first recorded loss of a delta-wing-design airframe.

• 1948 – Northwest Airlines Flight 421, a Martin 2-0-2, crashes near Winona, Minnesota due to structural failure of a wing, killing all 37 on board in the worst ever accident involving the Martin 2-0-2. This crash is also the first loss of a 2-0-2.

• 1947 – The world’s first ramjet helicopter, the McDonnell XH-20 Little Henry, makes its first flight. The ramjet-driven rotor eliminates the need for a torque-compensating tail rotor.

• 1945 – Airborne medical teams and supplies were dropped to prisoners of war in Burma and Siam (now Thailand).

• 1944 – The final airstrike of Operation Goodwood, Goodwood IV, is unsuccessful because a German smoke screen over Tirpitz makes her impossible to hit.

• 1931 – The Graf Zeppelin pioneers the air route between Germany and Brazil.

• 1929 – The Graf Zeppelin completes its global circumnavigation at Lakehurst, New Jersey.

• 1925 – First flight of the Gloster III

• 1911 – Hilda Hewlett becomes the first British woman to receive a pilot’s licence.

• 1909 – At the end of a two-day flight from Lake Constance during which Count von Zeppelin travels a total distance of more than 400 miles, he makes a spectacular flight in his dirigible LZ5 over the city of Berlin, Germany.

• 1879 – In Ontario, Nellie Thurston becomes the first Canadian woman to fly in a balloon.

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 |August 1

• 2013 – Entered in Service: Airbus A400M Atlas with the French Air Force.

• 2012 – In the Syrian Civil War, United Nations observers see Syrian Air Force jets bombing rebel-held districts in the Salheddine area of Aleppo.

• 2011 – The Government of Norway announces that it has completed the withdrawal of its six F-16 Fighting Falcons from Operation Unified Protector, the NATO intervention in the Libyan Civil War. The six Royal Norwegian Air Force fighters had flown 583 of the 6,493 sorties flown by NATO aircraft since NATO took command of the Libyan air campaign on 31 March and dropped 569 bombs.[1]

• 2010 – All West Freight Fairchild C-123 Provider N7099R crashes at Mount Healy, Alaska killing all three crew.[2]

• 2002 – First flight of the Scaled Composites White Knight

• 1997 – Boeing and McDonnell Douglas complete a merger, forming The Boeing Company.

• 1983 – America West Airlines begins flying, from Phoenix, Arizona.

• 1977 – Francis Gary Powers, US U-2 pilot, dies at 47.

• 1976 – (August 1 – October 1) After his 1973 RTW attempt was aborted by bad weather between Hokkaidō and the Aleutian Islands, Don Taylor of California successfully circumnavigates the world (Oshkosh eastbound to Oshkosh) in his Thorp T-18, the first aviator to do so with a homebuilt aircraft.

• 1973 – First flight of the Martin Marietta X-24B

• 1972 – Delta Air Lines absorbs Northeast Airlines

• 1966 – (1-25) The U. S. Army’s first Cavalry Division (Airmobile) conducts Operation Paul Revere II, a helicopter and ground assault against enemy forces in the Pleiku area of South Vietnam.

• 1966 – First flight of the McDonnell Douglas DC-9-30

• 1964 – ALM-Antillean Airlines is founded in Curaçao, Netherlands Antilles as an offshoot of KLM Royal Dutch to compete with Pan Am in the Caribbean and South America. Corruption, high debt and public disinterest drive the airline to bankruptcy in 2001.

• 1964 – A/M CR Slemon, the last original RCAF officer, retired after serving as Deputy Commander of NORAD.

• 1962 – The U. S. Marine Corps loses a helicopter in Vietnam for the first time when a South Vietnamese Air Force fighter skids off a runway at Soc Trang, South Vietnam, and damages an HUS-1 Seahorse transport helicopter beyond repair.

• 1959 – In what was intended to be a routine NACA flight but turns out to be the final flight ever of a North American F-107A, the second accident involving the type occurs when pilot Scott Crossfield cannot get 55-5120 to lift off of the dry lakebed at Edwards AFB, California due to improperly set stabilizer trim. Nosewheel tires blow, pilot aborts take-off, tries to taxi airframe into the wind when the left main gear catches fire, airframe suffers fire damage, F-107 flight program ends. Airframe of 55-5120 cut up at Edwards, fuselage shipped to Sheppard AFB, Texas, for use as fire training aid.

• 1958 – The North American Air Defence Agreement (NORAD) came into effect.

• 1957 – NORAD is formed to co-ordinate US and Canadian air defense

• 1952 – No. 427 Squadron was reformed at St. Hubert, Quebec and equipped with North American Sabre fighters.

• 1951 – Japan Air Lines is formed

• 1949 – First flight of the Northrop YC-125 Raider

• 1946 – British European Airways is established as state-owned corporation.

• 1945 – A USAAF Canadian Vickers OA-10A Catalina, 44-34096, en route from Hunter Field, Georgia, to Mather Field, California, crashes in the Cibola National Forest, 25 miles SW of Grants, New Mexico, after apparent engine failure, killing the seven crew, Lt. Wilson Parker, Lt. William Bartlett, Lt. James Garland, Sgt. Irwin Marcus, Sgt. Robert Crook, Sgt. Harold Post and Sgt. John Jackson. The airframe was so heavily damaged that no determination of the cause could be made.

• 1943 – The first Canadian-built four-engined aircraft, the Avro 683 Lancaster X, was flown at Malton, Ontario.

• 1943 – USAAF B-24 Liberators flying from Libya attack the Ploesti oil refineries in Romania.

• 1943 – Soviet fighter ace Lydia Litvak is shot down and killed. She had 12 victories at the time of her death.

• 1943 – 48 German aircraft make a surprise attack on ships in the harbor at Palermo, Sicily, dropping 60 large bombs and sinking a cargo ship.

• 1943 – During a demonstration flight of an "all St. Louis-built glider", a WACO CG-4A-RO, 42-78839, built by sub-contractor Robertson Aircraft Company, loses its starboard wing due to a defective wing strut support, plummets vertically to the ground at Lambert Field, St. Louis, Missouri, killing all on board, including St. Louis Mayor William D. Becker, Maj. William B. Robertson and Harold Krueger, both of Robertson Aircraft, Thomas Dysart, president of the St. Louis Chamber of Commerce, Max Doyne, director of public utilities, Charles Cunningham, department comptroller, Henry Mueller, St. Louis Court presiding judge, Lt. Col. Paul Hazleton, pilot Milton Kiugh, and mechanic J. M. Davis.[216] The failed component had been manufactured by Robertson subcontractor Gardner Metal Products Company, of St. Louis, who, ironically, had been a casket maker.

• 1941 – The United States embargoes the sale of aviation fuel to Japan.

• 1941 – The Soviet Union makes the first operational use of parasite fighters, attacking Constanța, Romania with modified Polikarpov I-16s carried into action by Tupolev TB-3s.

• 1936 – Ten more German Junkers Ju 52 transports and six Heinkel He 51 fighters arrive at Cadiz for service with the Spanish Nationalist faction.

• 1929 – Dr. Hugo Eckener commands the first airship flight to circumnavigate the globe when the flight leaves Friedrichshafen, Germany. Graf Zeppelin arrives back at Friedrichshafen on September 4, having logged 21,000 mi. 12 days, 12 hours, 20 min flying time.

• 1921 – First flight of the Curtiss CR

• 1919 – World War I Russian ace Aleksandr Kazakov (32 kills, but only 20 officially) is killed in the crash of what was probably a Sopwith Camel. On 1 August 1918 Kazakov became a major in the Royal Air Force and was appointed to be commanding officer in charge of an aviation squadron of the Slavo-British Allied Legion made up of Camels. After the British withdrawal from Russia which left the Russian White Army in a desperate situation, Kazakov died in a plane crash during an air show on this date which was performed to boost the morale of the Russian anti-Bolshevik troops. Most witnesses of the incident thought Kazakov committed suicide.

• 1916 – The first issue of America’s most influential and long-running aircraft magazine appears at a price of 5 cents. Called Aviation and Aeronautical Engineering, it is ancestor of Aviation Week & Space Technology and is published twice a month.

• 1915 – Lt Max Immelmann shoots down his first aircraft, beginning his career as an ace and the period that will become known as the "Fokker scourge"

• 1914 – Germany and Russia enter World War I with Germany’s declaration of war on Russia.

• 1911 – The Aero Club of America grants Harriet Quimby the first U. S. pilot’s license issued to a woman.

• 1909 – Entered Service: Wright Military Flyer into the US Army as Aeroplane No. 1

• 1907 An Aeronautical Division is formed in the U.S. Army Signal Corps to oversee "all matters pertaining to military ballooning, air machines, and all kindred subjects".

• 1799 – The French ship-of-the-line Orient has gear of the French Army‘s Company of Aeronauts on board when she is destroyed during the Battle of the Nile.

August 31

• 2012 – Richard Bach, author of the best-selling 1970 novel Jonathan Livingston Seagull, is badly injured in the crash of his Easton Gilbert SeaRey Puff (N346PE) on San Juan Island west of Friday Harbor Airport in Friday Harbor, Washington. He is piloting the plane at the time.[1]

• 2012 – Syrian rebels target government air bases, claiming to be trying to reduce the threat of air attacks on their forces. They reportedly shoot down a government helicopter in Sarmin, Syria.[2]

• 2012 – The Free Syria Army warns airlines to suspend service to Damascus and Aleppo, Syria, saying rebel forces could begin attacking airports in the two cities as early as the following week.[3]

• 2009 – Slovak airline SkyEurope files for bankruptcy.

• 2002 – First flight of the Learjet 40

• 2000 – Virgin Australia begins airline operations as Virgin Blue.

• 1999 – LAPA Flight 3142, a Boeing 737, overshoots the runway in Buenos Aires, Argentina and crashes into a golf course; of the 103 people on board, 63 are killed as well as two on the ground.

• 1998 – North Korea launches its first satellite, Kwangmyongsong.

• 1991 – A Tomahawk missile launched from a warship in the Gulf of Mexico to recover on a target on the test ranges at Eglin AFB, Florida, misses by ~100 miles, coming down eight miles E of Jackson, Alabama, ~60 miles N of Mobile. "Within minutes of the missile's falling near Jackson, a recovery team arrived by helicopter. Such teams are stationed along the missile's flight path during a test so they can get to a crash scene within 20 minutes no matter where the Tomahawk goes down." Cause was found to be two incorrect screws used to assemble a tailfin, said Denny Kline, a Pentagon spokesman for the Navy Cruise Missile Project, on 13 December 1991. A screw, rubbing against an actuator coil disabled one of the missile's two fins. "Somebody during assembly put two screws in, which were moderately too long. Well, in fact, in this case extremely too long because it physically made contact with a coil. It was fine for the first one hour and 21 minutes, but over time it wore away the protective coating and got down to the wound part of the coil and shorted it out," said Kline. As a result, one fin worked properly but the other did not when the missile was to make a pre-planned turn causing it to crash in Alabama. The wrong screws were put in by General Dynamics Corp., said Susan Boyd, Pentagon spokeswoman for the missile program. Four Tomahawks have landed in civilian areas since the Navy began the gulf tests in 1985. There have been no injuries.

• 1988 – Delta Air Lines Flight 1141, a Boeing 727, crashes on takeoff from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport as a result of pilot error; of 108 people on board, 12 passengers and two crew members are killed.

• 1988 – CAAC Flight 301, a Hawker Siddeley Trident operating a Guangzhou Baiyun Airport to Hong Kong Kai Tak Airport flight, ran off the runway in Hong Kong. 7 of the 89 passengers and crew on board were killed.

• 1987 – Thai Airways Flight 365, a Boeing 737, crashes into the ocean off the coast of Thailand as a result of pilot error. All 83 passengers and crew perish.

• 1986 – Aeroméxico Flight 498, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 with 64 people on board, and a privately owned Piper PA-28-181 Archer collide in mid-air over Cerritos, California. The collision decapitates all three people on the Archer and both aircraft crash, also killing everyine on board the DC-9 and 15 people on the ground, a total death toll of 82. Eight people on the ground suffer injuries.

• 1986 – First flight of the Mitsubishi H-60

• 1978 – Boeing begins production of the 757.

• 1977 – A Soviet Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 sets the world altitude record for airbreathing aircraft of 123,524 ft. (37,650 m).

• 1974 – William Pershing Benedict, American pilot, dies. Benedict is best known for having flown together with Lt. Col. Joseph O. Fletcher as his co-pilot1 a U. S. Air Force C-47 modified to have skis and wheels to the North Pole, where they became the first humans to land a plane on May 3, 1952 and (together with scientist Albert P. Crary) the first persons to set foot on the exact geographical North Pole.

• 1969 – World champion boxer Rocky Marciano dies when his plane crashes.

• 1968 – The Rolls-Royce RB.211 is successfully ground-tested

• 1965 – First flight of the Aero Spacelines Super Guppy

• 1961 – Chance Vought Incorporated and Ling-Temco Electronics merge to form Ling-Temco-Vought, Inc.

• 1958 – First flight of the North American A-5 Vigilante

• 1956 – Entered Service: Avro Vulcan with No. 83 Squadron RAF

• 1956 – Fourteenth Lockheed U-2A, 56-6687, Article 354, delivered to the Central Intelligence Agency 27 July 1956. Crashed at Groom Lake, Nevada this date during a night training flight, killing pilot Frank G. Grace, Jr. Pilot became disoriented by lights near the end of the runway and flew into a telephone pole.

• 1955 – The first Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker (serial no. 55-3118), the City of Renton, makes its first flight, and is taken over by the USAF on January 31, 1957.

• 1955 – Lockheed Aircraft Corporation engineering test pilot Stanley Beltz is killed in a crash near Lancaster, California, while piloting an F-94 B Starfire modified to test the nose section of the BOMARC missile.

• 1954 – Sole Cessna XL-19B Bird Dog, 52-1804, c/n 22780A, modified with Boeing XT-50-BO-1 210 shp turboprop engine, crashes 2 miles (3.2 km) W of Sedgwick, Kansas.

• 1950 – TWA Flight 903, a Lockheed L-749 A Constellation, crashes because of an engine fire, in the desert about 65 miles (105 km) NNW of Cairo, Egypt; all 55 on board are killed in the worst ever accident involving the Lockheed L-749.

• 1947 – First flight of the Antonov An-2

• 1946 – Stranraer CF-BYL, operated by Spilsbury & Hepburn Ltd, Vancouver, predecessor of Queen Charlotte Airline, disappeared without a trace with seven on board on a flight from Prince Rupert to Stewart, British Columbia.

• 1942 – Since June 1, Royal Air Force Bomber Command has dispatched 11,169 sorties and lost 531 aircraft, of which German night fighters have shot down 349, averaging 116 kills per month.

• 1942 – First flight of the Martin-Baker MB 3

• 1940 – The Lovettsville air disaster occurred on 1940 near Lovettsville, Virginia. Pennsylvania Central Airlines Trip 19 was a new Douglas DC-3 A that was flying through an intense thunderstorm at 6,000 feet (1,800 m). Numerous witnesses reported seeing a large flash of lightning shortly before it nosed over and plunged to earth in an alfalfa field. With limited accident investigation tools at the time, it was at first believed that the most likely cause was the plane flying into windshear, but the Civil Aeronautics Board report concluded that the probable cause was a lightning strike. U. S. Senator Ernest Lundeen from Minnesota was one of those killed.

• 1940 – Polish 303 Squadron, the most efficient allied unit of the Battle of Britain, enters action.

• 1940 – The Lovettsville air disaster: Pennsylvania Central Airlines Trip 19, a Douglas DC-3 A, crashes at Lovettsville, Virginia, killing all 25 aboard in the worst US airplane accident to that date, beginning the era of formal investigations under the Civil Aeronautics Board.

• 1927 – Princess Anne of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Freudenberg was both the first woman to attempt and perish in a transatlantic airplane flight.

• 1925 – U.S. Navy Naval Aircraft Factory PN-9, BuNo A-6878, '1', flying boat disappears on flight from San Francisco to Hawaii with reported loss of crew. The PN-9 was not actually lost, it was just overdue. After staying in the air for 25 hours and covering 1,841 of the 2,400 miles to Pearl Harbor, it landed safely at sea, the crew under command of Commander John Rodgers, Naval Aviator No. 2, rigged sails from fabric from the lower wing and sailed the final 450 miles, reaching Kauai on 10 September. This stood as a seaplane distance flight record for several years. Aircraft is repaired and shipped to San Diego, California.

• 1924 – Six United States Army Air Service aviators flying Douglas World Cruisers arrive in Labrador, completing the transatlantic leg of their first aerial circumnavigation of the world.

• 1921 – U.S. Navy airship D-6, A5972, with a C-type envelope built by Goodyear in 1920 and a special enclosed car built by the Naval Aircraft Factory, is destroyed along with two small dirigibles, the C-10 and the Goodyear airship H-1, A5973, the sole H-model, a powered two-seat observation balloon built along the lines of the commercial Goodyear "Pony Blimp", and the kite balloon A-P.

• 1921 – The first production Vickers Vernon, the first troop carrier designed for the British RAF (Royal Air Force), was delivered by the British manufacturer.

• 1915 – The first French ace Adolphe Pegoud is killed in combat. He scored 6 victories.