JUL25

1916 - Birth of Stefan Pucas, Romanian WWII flying ace

http://cieldegloire.com/012_pucas_s.php

1918 - Harold Ross Harris (along with his co-pilot, George Lewis) commanded the 1st US Army flight flying heavy bombers (Caproni) on a reconnaisance mission over the Alps from Italy to France and return.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_R._Harris#Early_years - http://earlyaviators.com/eharish2.htm

1918 - Death of Joseph Henry Siddall, British WWI flying ace, Killed in action in his Sopwith Camel.

http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/england/siddall.php

1918 - Death of John Steele Ralston, Scottish WWI flying ace, Killed in action in his S.E.5a.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Steele_Ralston - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/scotland/ralston1.php

1923 - 1st Canadian built amphibian, the Vickers type 85 Viking IV, was flown from the St. Lawrence at Montreal.

http://canadianaviationhistory.pbworks.com/w/page/13801119/On-this-day-in-Canadian-Aviation-History-July

1927 - Carleton Cole Champion took off from Anacostia, D.C., in the Wright XF3W Apache rigged as a landplane and reached 38,419 feet, establishing a new world record

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=64501160

1932 - Birth of Paul Joseph Weitz, USN Pilot and NASA astronaut

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_J._Weitz

1934 - 1st flight of the Potez 41, French 5 seat low wing monoplane 4 engined (tandem configuration) bomber prototype.

http://aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=10243

1935 - 1st flight of the Latécoère 582, French parasol-wing monoplane 3 engined long-range patrol flying-boat prototype.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lat%C3%A9co%C3%A8re_582 - http://aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=928

1936 - 1st flight of the Lioré et Olivier LeO H-47, French 4 engines (Tandem tractor-Pusher) high-wing flying boat.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lior%C3%A9_et_Olivier_LeO_H-47 - http://aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=147

1937 - 1st flight of the Amiot 370, twin seat twin engine prototype, evolution of the Amiot 340, designed for long distance raids.

http://www.aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=3179

1937 – The Battle of Brunete ends. During the 20-day-long battle, the Republicans have lost about 100 aircraft, while the Nationalists have lost 23. The appearance of the German Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter and Heinkel He 111 bomber and the Italian Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 bomber in numbers during the battle signals the end of Republican air superiority in the Spanish Civil War.

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

1938 – The Battle of the Ebro begins in Spain with a Republican offensive. Although Nationalist bombers attack bridges over the Ebro, Nationalist fighters are still deployed in Valencia and Spanish Republican fighter pilots trained in the Soviet Union gain local air superiority flying improved versions of the Polikarpov I-15 and I-16.

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

1939 - Deutsche Lufthansa Focke Wulf Fw-200 'Condor', Takes off from Berlin to Bangkok in Siam, inaugurating a regular service.

http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/research/history-of-aviation-timeline/interactive-aviation-timeline/world-aviation/1939.aspx

1939 - 1st flight of The Avro 679 Manchester, British twin-engine heavy bomber, forerunner to the famous Avro Lancaster.

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

1941 - 1st flight of the Max Holste MH-20, French low wing monoplane racer prototype.

http://aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=10049

1943 - Last raid on Essen during the Battle of the Ruhr. 705 aircraft of which 3.7 were lost. The raid had been planned to take advantage of the recent introduction of "Window". "The Krupps works suffered what was probably its most damaging raid of the war".

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

1944 - Death of James Cairn 'Bud' Mars (also known as the Curtiss Daredevil), American aviation pioneer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_C._Mars

1946 – Baker Test during Operation Crossroads: an atomic bomb is detonated underwater in the lagoon of Bikini atoll.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Crossroads#Test_Baker

1948 - On the 39th anniversary of Bleriot's crossing of the Channel, the Vickers 618 Nene-Viking loaded with passengers (24 was the usual maximum) at London Heathrow and flew them in great comfort to Villacoublay, Paris, in 34 min 7 sec, less than half the regular scheduled time and faster than a previous record set by a Spitfire.

http://www.aviastar.org/air/england/vickers_neneviking.php

1949 - Squadron Leader Bob Kipp of the Canadian Blue Devils aerobatic team is killed in a training accident in his de Havilland Vampire near St Hubert.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Devils_(aerobatic_team)

1957 - Birth of Daniel Wheeler Bursch, USN test pilot and NASA astronaut,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_W._Bursch

1959 - Death of Wolfram Kurt Erhard Hirth , German gliding pioneer and sailplane designer.

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

1959 - The sole Snecma C-450 'Coleoptère', French single-person with an annular wing VTO aircraft prototype, is destroyed when control is lost at an altitude of about 75m during transition from vertical to horizontal flight.

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snecma_C-450_Col%C3%A9opt%C3%A8re - http://www.aviastar.org/air/france/snecma_coleoptere.php

1962 - 1st flight of the Jurca MJ-5 'Sirocco', French two-seat low-wing cantilever monoplane of conventional configuration and wooden construction sport aircraft marketed for homebuilding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurca_Sirocco - http://aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=2431

1973 - Launch of Mars 5, unmanned Soviet spacecraft which intended to explore Mars.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_4#Mars_5

1977 - 1st flight of The Aero Design DG-1, American racing prototype aircraft, built in an attempt to break the world airspeed record for a piston-engined aircraft, single-seat with two Mazda RX-3 engines installed, one driving a tractor propellor, the other driving a pusher.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aero_Design_DG-1

1979 - 1st flight of The PZL-Mielec M-20 Mewa (Gull), licence-built version of the Piper PA-34 Seneca II manufactured in Poland by WSK PZL Mielec.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PZL_M-20_Mewa

1984 – Soyuz T-12 : cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the 1st woman to perform a space walk.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_T-12 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svetlana_Savitskaya

1985 - Death of Thomas Frederic Williams, Canadian WWI fighter ace, Barnstormer, one of the founder of the RCAF, chief test pilot for Fleet Aircraft Company, aerobatic pilot and author.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_F._Williams - http://theaerodrome.com/aces/canada/williams4.php

1987 - Death of Charles Stark Draper, American scientist and engineer, often referred to as "the father of inertial navigation."

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

1997 - Death of Commander Peter 'Hoagy' Carmichael, British fighter pilot with the Royal Navy during and after WWII.

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

1999 - Swedish Mikael Carlson, re-enacted the 1st cross-Channel flight 90 years after Louis Blériot's historic journey, flying his own vintage Blériot XI plane.

http://www.aerodrome.se/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=19:the-channel-crossing&catid=1:news&Itemid=11

2000 - Air France Flight 4590 Concorde catches fire after takeoff, crashing and killing all 100 passengers, nine crew and four people on the ground, at Gonesse, France. This was the only fatal crash of a Concorde. It was the beginning of the end for the Concorde as an airliner

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_4590

2001 - STS-104, Space Shuttle Atlantis mission to the International Space Station (ISS), is back on earth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-104

2003 - Death of Ludwig Bölkow, German aeronautical pioneer.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_B%C3%B6lkow

2009 - Celebrating the 1st cross-Channel flight 100 years after Louis Blériot's historic journey, French Edmond Salis crosses the Channel in a Bleriot XI replica.

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bl%C3%A9riot_XI#Die_XI_heute - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8165110.stm

2011 - Death of Arthur Warren "Kit" Murray, American test pilot who flew test flights on the Bell X-1 and the Bell X-5 aircraft.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_W._Murray