JAN16
1866 - Birth of Percy Sinclair Pilcher, British inventor and pioneer aviator, foremost experimenter in unpowered flight.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Pilcher
1886 - Birth of Reinhold Platz, German aircraft designer and manufacturer in service of the Dutch company Fokker.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Platz
1888 - Birth of Alfred William Saunders, Irish WWI fighter ace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_William_Saunders - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/ireland/saunders1.php
1894 - Birth of Konrad Mettlich, German WWI flying ace.
http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/germany/mettlich.php
1900 - Birth of Giovanni Monti, italian soccer player and aviator.
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_Monti
1910 - Birth of David McCampbell, American WWII fighter pilot, US Navy all-time leading ace.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_McCampbell
1911 - Birth of Major Floyd Bruce Parks, WWII USMC Pilot.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floyd_B._Parks
1913 - Death of Thaddeus Sobieski Coulincourt Lowe, also known as Professor T. S. C. Lowe, American Civil War aeronaut.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thaddeus_S._C._Lowe
1918 - Death of Harold W. Blakely, early american aviator, at Central Park, L. I., while making a trial flight in a Curtiss Model V fitted with the 1st 12-cylinder Liberty engine installed.
http://earlyaviators.com/eblakele.htm
1922 - Death of Alan John Lance Scott, New Zealand WWI flying ace. He has been Winston Churchill's flying instructor.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_John_Lance_Scott
1925 - Birth of James Robinson "Robbie" Risner, American Flying ace during the Korean and Vietnam Wars.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Robinson_Risner - http://www.cieldegloire.com/014_risner_r.php
1926 - Death of Jean Georges Bouyer, French WWI flying ace, in the crash of his Hanriot.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_G._Bouyer - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/france/bouyer.php
1929 - Lady Mary Bailey complete her return flight from Cape Town to London in her de Havilland DH60 Moth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Bailey_(aviator)
1933 - Jean Mermoz and crew make a non-stop flight from Senegal to Argentina, across South Atlantic, in 17 hours 27 minutes with the Couzinet 70 Arc-en-ciel III.
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9_Couzinet
1934 - 1st flight of The Northrop XFT, American prototype fighter aircraft, single engined low-winged monoplane, designed and built to meet a United States Navy order for an advanced carrier based fighter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_XFT
1936 - Death of James "Jimmy" Armand Meissner, American WWI flying ace who organized the Birmingham Flying Club, nicknamed the "Birmingham Escadrille", which became Alabama's 1st Air National Guard unit and the 7th in the USA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Meissner - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/usa/meissner.php
1941 - The Luftwaffe mounts its 1st heavy attack on Malta, targeted on the carrier HMS Illustrious.
1942 – TWA Flight 3 Douglas DC-3-382 slammed into a sheer cliff on Potosi Mountain, killing all 22 aboard, including film star Carole Lombard.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TWA_Flight_3
1946 - Birth of Michael Lloyd Coats, USN Pilot, engineer and NASA astronaut,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Coats
1948 - Birth of Anatoly Yakovlevich Solovyev,Soviet pilot and cosmonaut.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoly_Solovyev
1952 - Birth of Lloyd Blaine Hammond, Jr.,Gulfstream test pilot, USAF officer, and NASA astronaut
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L._Blaine_Hammond
1955 - Birth of Jerry Michael Linenger, USN Officer and NASA astronaut.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_M._Linenger
1957 - Operation Power Flite, USAF mission, five B-52B aircraft of the 93rd Bombardment Wing of the 15th Air Force took off from Castle Air Force Base in California with two of the planes flying as spares to demonstrate that the USA had the ability to drop a hydrogen bomb anywhere in the world.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Power_Flite
1962 - 1st flight of The Fuji KM-2, Japanese propeller-driven light aircraft, developed by Fuji Heavy Industries from the Beech T-34.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuji_KM-2
1963 - Yvonne Pope becomes the 1st UK woman airline pilot to fly international routes, flying from Gatwick to Dusseldorf for Morton Air Service
1969 - Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 docked, 1st-ever docking of two manned spacecraft of any nation, and the 1st-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another of any nation,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_4 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_5
1972 - Death of Reed McKinley Chambers, American WWI flying ace who founded Florida Airways, which received the 1st private air mail contract awarded by the U.S. Government. He also gounded the US Aircraft Insurance Group, US 1st aviation insurance company.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reed_Chambers - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/usa/chambers2.php
1975 - USAF sets new climb-time records with a stripped and unpainted McDonnell Douglas F-15A Streak Eagle aircraft, operating from Grand Forks Air Force Base, North Dakota. The Streak Eagle reaches a height of 3,000 m (9,843 ft.) in 27.57 sec., 6,000 m (19,685 ft.) in 39.33 sec., 9,000 m (929,528 ft.) in 48.86 sec., 12,000 m (39,370 ft.) in 59.38 sec. and 15,000 m (42,2132 ft.) in 1 min. 17.02 sec
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_F-15_Eagle#Research_and_test
1978 - Soyuz 26, Soviet manned mission, used to launch the crew of Salyut 6 EO-1, 1st long duration crew on the space station Salyut 6., is back on earth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_26
1979 - Death of Squadron Commander Christopher Draper, English flying ace of WWI. His penchant for flying under bridges earned him the nickname "the Mad Major."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Draper- http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/england/draper.php
1980 - Air UK starts operations after merging British Island Airways and Air Anglia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_UK#.22Third_Force.22
1981 - Death of Leo C. Young, American radio engineer who had many accomplishments during a long career at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. Although self-educated, he was a member of a small, creative team that is generally credited with developing the world's first true radar system.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_C._Young
1984 - Death of Kenneth A. Arnold, American aviator and businessman. He is best-known for making what is generally considered the 1st widely reported unidentified flying object sighting in the United States, after claiming to have seen nine unusual objects flying in a chain near Mount Rainier, Washington
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Arnold
1992 - 1st flight of The Harbin Z-9B 'Haitun', Chinese military utility helicopter, license-built version of the French Eurocopter Dauphin,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harbin_Z-9
1995 - Death of Percival Hopkins Spencer, American inventor, aviation pioneer, test pilot and businessman.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percival_H._Spencer
2001 - Shenzhou 2, 2nd chinese unmanned Shenzhou spacecraft, is back on earth
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenzhou_2
2001 - Death of Constantin Balta, Romanian WWII flying ace, Post War high ranking officer before entering the Civil Aviation General Authority.
http://www.worldwar2.ro/arr/p018.htm - http://cieldegloire.com/012_balta_c.php
2002 - Death of Robert Hanbury Brown, British astronomer and physicist who made notable contributions to the development of radar and he later conducted pioneering work in the field of radio astronomy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanbury_Brown
2003 - Launch of STS-107, Last flight of Space Shuttle Columbia which will disintegrate during re-entry .