The first airplane fatality(amusingplanet.com) |
The first airplane fatality(amusingplanet.com) |
1: The contract was for a plane to fly for an hour, at 30mph out and back, carrying two people (pilot and observer). There was a 10% penalty on the 25,000 for every mph by which the plane was slower than 30mph, and a 10% bonus for every mph by which the plane was above 30mph. The Military Flyer averaged 32 mph on the loop it did, so the Army paid the Wright's $30,000.
2: There are 8 surviving original Wright Airplanes left in the world, the Smithsonian owns three of them: the 1903 Wright Flyer, the 1909 Military Flyer, and the Model Ex Vin Fizz.
That airport is still operating and is the oldest continuously operating airport in the world.
https://www.nps.gov/articles/college-park-airport.htm
FWIW, I think there are 5 surviving original Wright bicycles, so they are outnumbered by the airplanes.
It’s kinda wild to me how reliable we are at having to learn the hard way to wear a helmet for each new sport or endeavour.
Hard hats, of assorted kinds for general protection while working, date back to the 1890s and became more commonplace ~1920 (ish) onwards in construction, mining, and ship building industries.
* Helmets: https://www.battlemerchant.com/en/blog/the-evolution-of-hist...
* Hard Hats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_hat
I suspect there are more early European hard hat examples to be found than are cited in the wikipedia article.
I just read that the trip was still a 5 day journey, involving 20+ stops and spinning that takeoff and landing roulette wheel quite a bit..
The novelty factor might have been just as big a deal as time savings. It was something cool to try as an ultra wealthy globe trotter.
> The plane took off – for the 1st leg of the flight from Amsterdam to Batavia – on 30 April. The schedule: Budapest 30 April, Athens 1 May, Cairo 2 May, Baghdad 3 May, Jask 4 May, Jodhpur 5 May, Calcutta 6 May, Tavoy 7 May, Medan 8 May and arriving in Batavia on 9 May.
This page(2) claims a max speed of 190km/h. Budapest to Athens is 1130 km apart, so if the plane was flying around 150km/h, it's a 7 hour trip for that segment. Ouch. At least the passengers probably had a nice dinner and slept every night in a nice hotel...
(1) https://dutchaustralianculturalcentre.com.au/archive/dutch-a...
(2) https://aircraftinvestigation.info/airplanes/Fokker_F.VIIa.h...
https://digitalcollections.museumofflight.org/nodes/search?k...
Accidents generally go up as you move down the scale of regularly scheduled airlines -> charter -> private with professional crew -> private flying.
There is zero chance 100 people could fly private airplanes everyday for their whole life and only one dies. I suppose if you look at 100 skilled pilots flying private aircraft for 50 years daily.. still would be a lot worse
1. P-51 engine swallowed a valve and failed completely (the P-51 flies like a rock when the engine isn't turning) but fortunately he was over the airfield at the time
2. a total failure of an F-86 engine (F-86 is a decent glider and he was able to glide in on the airfield)
3. his P-51 rear fuselage crumpled after a turn. The mechanic told him he was amazed it didn't come off completely
4. flew into clear air turbulence that was so violent the wings were bent and were scrapped
My dad flew F-180s in the Korean War. It was the first operational US jet fighter. It had straight wings (not swept) and had a powerful engine.
He related to me that if you exceeded a certain speed, the airplane would suddenly "pitch up" and fold the wings back. You had to be very careful not to overspeed, which (of course) was very difficult to do in a diving attack. (He said he kept one eye on the target, one eye on the altitude, and one eye on the airspeed.) Anyhow, mission one of his buddies had a Mig on his tail and could not shake it. He decided that he'd deliberately induce the pitch up, and hope that would get him out of the jam. He did, pitched up, the Mig couldn't follow it, and miraculously the wings stayed on.
He carefully flew it back to base. The wings were bent up, and the airplane was scrapped.