JUL15

1916 - Birth of Harrison Allen 'Stormy' Storms, Jr., American aeronautical engineer best known for his role in managing the design and construction of the command module for the Apollo program.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Storms - http://www.astronautix.com/astros/storms.htm

1918 - Death of Friedrich "Fritz" Friedrichs, German WWI fighter ace, his Fokker D.VII bursting into flames when the incendiary bullets he used for attacking balloons exploded. As he bailed out, his parachute caught and tore on the tailplane.

http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/germany/friedrichs.php - http://www.flieger-album.de/geschichte/portraits/portraitfriedrichfriedrichs.php

1919 - Aircraft Transport and Travel Limited, British airline, makes a proving flight across the English Channel in an Airco DH.9 between RAF Hendon and Paris - Le Bourget Airport, the flight took 2 hours and 30 minutes, and cost £21 per passenger.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_Transport_and_Travel

1919 – Royal Navy North Sea class airship N.S.11 burns over the North Sea off Norfolk, England, killing 12. It was thought that a lightning strike may have caused the explosion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NS_class_blimp#Other_ships

1923 – Dobrolet, the Soviet state airline, opens its 1st scheduled domestic service, between Moscow and Nizhniy Novgorod.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot#Early_history_of_Soviet_civil_aviation

1924 - 1st flight of the Blériot Bl-106, French Single engine high wing cabin monoplane transport prototype.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bl%C3%A9riot_106 - http://www.aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=1669

1925 - Dr. Alexander Hamilton Rice's expedition to the Amazon to explore the headwaters of the Amazon, the 1st exploration by airplane, returns safely.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Aviation/Historical_anniversaries/July_in_aviation/July_15

1927 - Death of Paul Wilhelm Bäumer, German WWI fighter ace, killed in a crash near Copenhagen while test flying a Rohrbach Rofix fighter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_B%C3%A4umer - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/germany/baumer.php

1927 - 1st flight of The Bristol Bagshot, also known as the Type 95, heavily-armed British fighter prototype.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Bagshot

1930 - Death of Frank Benjamin Tyndall, American WWI pilot, test pilot, killed in a crash of a Curtiss P-1F Hawk, out of Langley Field, Virginia.

http://earlyaviators.com/etyndall.htm

1932 – The sole prototype low-wing monoplane Vickers Type 171 Jockey is lost during spinning trials at Martlesham Heath when it enters a flat spin, crashing at Woodbridge, Suffolk, pilot successfully bailing out at 5,000 feet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickers_Jockey#Development

1933 - Lithuanians Steponas Darius and Stasys Girenas take off from Floyd Bennett Field in New York for a non-stop flight to Kaunas, Lithuania in a Bellanca CH-300 Pacemaker named 'Lituanica'.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darius_and_Girenas#Flight

1933 - Wiley Post takes off from Floyd Bennett Field in his Lockheed Vega "Winnie Mae" for the 1st round the world solo flight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiley_Post#First_solo_pilot - http://acepilots.com/post.html

1934 - Continental Airlines, major American airline, begins operations

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_Airlines

1938 - 1st flight of The production model Dornier Do 22/See, German three-seat, parasol wing monoplane, single-engined military floatplane.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dornier_Do_22

1938 - The Arado Ar 79, German aerobatic two-seat trainer and touring aircraft, set a speed record on 1,000 km (621.4 mi) at 229.04 km/h (142.32 mph).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arado_Ar_79

1939 - American Clara Adams lands back in New York, 1st woman to complete a round world flight (as passenger). Traveling on Pan American, Deutsche Lufthansa, KLM, and United Airlines, she circled the globe in 16 days and 19 hours, with stops in Horta, Lisbon, Marseille, Leipzig, Athens, Basra, Jodphur, Rangoon, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Manila, Guam, Wake Island, Midway Island, Honolulu, and San Francisco,

http://www.airships.net/clara-adams-aviation-pioneer

1941 - 1st pilot to claim 100 victories is German WWII fighter ace Werner Mölders

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werner_M%C3%B6lders#Eastern_Front - http://www.luftwaffe.cz/molders.html

1942 - Operations Colima and Pinpoint: 31 Supermarine Spitfires are flown to Malta from the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle.

http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/research/history-of-aviation-timeline/interactive-aviation-timeline/british-military-aviation/1942.aspx

1944 - Death of Joseph Sadi-Lecointe, french aviator who setted some altitude and speed records.

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Sadi-Lecointe

1946 - 1st flight of The Canadair North Star, four-engined propeller-driven airliner, Canadian development of the Douglas C-54 / DC-4 aircraft.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadair_North_Star

1947 - Northwest Airlines flies the 1st commercial passenger flight from the U.S. to Japan, using The Manila, a Douglas DC-4 aircraft, by way of Anchorage. From Tokyo, the flight continued to Seoul, Shanghai, and Manila.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Airlines#Beginnings

1949 - 1st flight of the Yakovlev Yak-50, early Soviet experimental turbojet interceptor aircraft.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakovlev_Yak-50_(1949)#Testing

1950 - Death of Heinz-Wolfgang Schnaufer, German Luftwaffe night fighter pilot and highest scoring (121) night fighter ace in the history of aerial warfare.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinz-Wolfgang_Schnaufer - http://www.luftwaffe.cz/schnaufer.html

1952 - A pair of USAF H-19 Chickasaws Begin the 1st transatlantic crossing by helicopter

http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/research/history-of-aviation-timeline/interactive-aviation-timeline/world-aviation/1952.aspx

1953 - Fuji Jukogyo Kabushiki Kaisha, successor to Nakajima Aircraft Company, is formed.

http://www.aviastar.org/manufacturers/0928.html

1954 - 1st flight of The Boeing 367-80 ("Dash 80" within Boeing), American prototype jet transport built to demonstrate the advantages of jet aircraft for passenger transport over piston-engine airliners

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_367-80

1955 - Death of George Lawrence "Zulu" Lloyd, South African WWI flying ace

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Lloyd_(aviator) - http://theaerodrome.com/aces/safrica/lloyd.php

1958 - Ghana Airways begins operations

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghana_Airways

1958 - 1st full transition from vertical flight to horizontal flight of The Vertol VZ-2 (or Model 76), US research aircraft built to investigate the tiltwing approach to vertical take-off and landing. The aircraft had a fuselage of tubular framework (originally uncovered) and accommodation for its pilot in a helicopter-like bubble canopy. The T-tail incorporated small ducted fans to act as thrusters for greater control at low speeds.

http://www.aviastar.org/helicopters_eng/bvertol_vz-2.php

1960 - 1st flight of the Emigh "Commuter Jr", US Single-seat open-cockpit helicopter for home-builders.

http://www.aviastar.org/helicopters_eng/emigh.php

1964 - 1st flight of The Aermacchi SF.250, Italian light prototyper aircraft marketed as an aerobatics plane and a military trainer, which will be produced as SF.260.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aermacchi_SF.260

1969 - The Tupolev Tu-144 'Charger' is the 1st commercial transport to exceed Mach 2.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-144

1975 - Launch of Soyuz 19 and Apollo–Soyuz Test Project, last Apollo mission, and 1st joint U.S./Soviet space flight for docking an American Apollo spacecraft with a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft, last manned US space mission until the 1st Space Shuttle flight

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo%E2%80%93Soyuz_Test_Project

1996 – A Belgian Air Force C-130 Hercules carrying the Royal Netherlands Army marching band crashes on landing at Eindhoven Airport.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eindhoven_Airport - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herculesramp

1997 - 1st flight of The Beriev Be-103 Bekas, Russian 5 seat mid-wing monoplane amphibious seaplane

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beriev_Be-103

2004 - 1st flight of The Alenia Aermacchi M-346 Master, Italian military transonic trainer aircraft, based on the Yak-130, developed by Yakovlev and Aermacchi as a joint venture.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aermacchi_M-346

2008 - 1st flight of The ICON A5, American 2 seat high-wing amphibious light-sport pusher aircraft prototype with a carbon fiber airframe and retractable undercarriage, which wings can be folded aft for ground transport and storage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICON_A5

2009 - Caspian Airlines Flight 7908 Tupolev Tu-154M crashed near the village of Jannatabad, outside the city of Qazvin in north-western Iran killing 168, 16 minutes after take-off from Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airport when the aircraft's tail suddenly caught on fire.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caspian_Airlines_Flight_7908

2009 - Launch of STS-127, NASA Space Shuttle mission Endeavour to the International Space Station (ISS).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-127

2010 - 1st manned flight of the Virgin Galactic VSS Enterprise, American commercial suborbital spacecraft constructed by Scaled Composites.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VSS_Enterprise

2011 - Launch of GSAT-12, Indian communication satellite.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GSAT-12

2012 - Death of Sadamu Komachi, Japanese WWII fighter ace who participated in the last Japanese combat mission.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadamu_Komachi - http://www.cieldegloire.com/010_komachi_s.php