MAY22
1888 - Birth of Jacques Victor Sabattier de Vignolle, French WWI flying ace
http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/france/sabattier.php
1897 - Birth of Enrico Pezzi, italian General and WWII Pilot.
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enrico_Pezzi
1897 - Birth of Wilhelm "Willi" Schulz, German WWI flying ace
http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/germany/schulz.php
1898 - Birth of Conway MacAlister Gray "Con" Farrell, Canadian WWI flying ace, well-known bush pilot, one of Canada's 1st air mail pilots. He returned to service during WWII, and postwar joined Canadian Pacific Air Lines, becoming 1st Manager of Repairs for them, Manager of Operations for the Orient.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway_Farrell - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/canada/farrell.php
1902 - Birth of Ettore Muti, italian WWII pilot and Fascist politician.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ettore_Muti
1906 - Birth of Cesare Toschi, Italian WWII Pilot
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cesare_Toschi
1906 - The Wright brothers are granted US patent No. 821,393 for their airplane control system.
http://invention.psychology.msstate.edu/i/Wrights/WrightUSPatent/WrightPatent.html
1910 - Birth of Julio Salvador y Díaz-Benjumea, Spanish Nationalist fighter ace of the civil war, later general in the Spanish air Force and Air Minister.
http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julio_Salvador_y_D%C3%ADaz-Benjumea - http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/spain_salvador.htm
1911 - Birth of Yevgenii Nikolaevich Stepanov, Soviet flying ace during the Spanish war, Sino Japanese war and Finnish-Soviet Winter War. Didn't flew in WWII but remained in the air force postwar.
http://www.cieldegloire.com/015_stepanov_y_n.php - http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/soviet_stepanov.htm
1918 - 1st flight of The Handley Page V/1500, British night-flying heavy bomber.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handley_Page_V/1500
1919 - Death of Albert Desbrisay Carter, Canadian WWI fighter ace, killed in a flying accident while test flying a Fokker D.VII.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Desbrisay_Carter - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/canada/carter1.php
1922 - 1st flight of the Udet U-8, German Single engine High wing 4 seat transport aircraft.
http://www.aviastar.org/air/germany/udet_u-8.php - http://www.histaviation.com/Udet_U-8.html
1928 - 1st flight of the Blériot Bl-175 (a Bl-165 modified), French twin engine biplane airliner prototype.
http://www.aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=1675
1930 - Death of Alfred William Saunders, Irish WWI fighter ace, in the crash of his de Havilland Gipsy Moth in Auckland, New Zealand.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_William_Saunders - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/ireland/saunders1.php
1931 - 1st flight of the Berliner-Joyce XFJ-2, American prototype biplane fighter aircraft.
http://www.aviastar.org/air/usa/berliner-joyce_xfj-2.php
1934 - 1st flight of the Botali-du Riveau P.A.M.A. type 1, French single seat high wing monoplane motor glider prototype.
http://www.aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=10222
1934 - 1st flight of the Caudron C.430 'Rafale', French twin seat low wing monoplane sport aircraft prototype.
http://www.aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=9840
1936 - Aer Lingus Teoranta is registered as an airline and becomes the national airline of the Republic of Ireland.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aer_Lingus
1937 – The Spanish Republican Air Force sends fighters on a risky flight across Nationalist-controlled territory to Republican bases in northern Spain to support the Basque defense against Nationalist forces there; seven of them arrive safely
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Aviation/Historical_anniversaries/May_in_aviation/May_22
1941 – German dive bombers attack a British naval task force as it retires westward after raiding caiques carrying German troops north of Crete. They sink the light cruisers HMS Fiji and HMS Gloucester and the destroyer HMS Greyhound and damage the battleship HMS Warspite and the light cruisers HMS Carlisle and HMS Naiad.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Fiji#Sinking - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Crete#Second_landing_attempt
1942 - Death of Tateo Kato, Japanese 2nd Sino-Japanese War and WWII fighter ace, Killed in his Ki-43 by a RAF turrett gunner of a Bristol Blenheim bomber over the Bay of Bengal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tateo_Kat%C5%8D - http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/japan_kato.htm - http://www.cieldegloire.com/010_kato_t.php
1943 - Royal Air Force scatters 1st copies of The Flying Hollander.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Aviation/Historical_anniversaries/May_in_aviation
1943 – A U. S. Navy antisubmarine hunter-killer group scores a kill of an enemy submarine for the 1st time, when TBM Avengers of Composite Squadron 9 (VC-9} from the escort aircraft carrier USS Bogue (CVE-9) sink the German submarine U-569 in the North Atlantic Ocean.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Bogue_(CVE-9)#Service_history - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_submarine_U-569#9th_patrol_and_loss
http://www.uboat.net/boats/u569.htm
1946 - 1st flight of The de Havilland Canada DHC-1 Chipmunk, tandem, two-seat, single-engined primary trainer aircraft which was the standard primary trainer for the Royal Canadian Air Force, Royal Air Force and several other air forces through much of the post-Second World War years. The de Havilland Chipmunk was the 1st true postwar aviation project of de Havilland Canada.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Havilland_Canada_DHC-1_Chipmunk
1953 - S/L Keith R. Greenaway won the McKee Trans-Canada Trophy in recognition of his new methods of aerial navigation in the Arctic regions.
1957 – A U.S. Air Force B-36J-5-CF Peacemaker, ferrying a Mark 17 nuclear bomb from Biggs AFB, Texas to Kirtland AFB, New Mexico, accidentally drops it through closed bomb doors, impacting 4.5 miles (7.2 km) south of Kirtland tower. Only the conventional trigger detonated, the bomb being unarmed, creating a crater of 25X12 feet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_B-36#Notable_incidents_and_accidents
1958 - 1st flight of The Sikorsky S-62, single turbine engine, single rotor amphibious helicopter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_S-62
1959 - Birth of Matevž Lenarcic, Slovenian raid aviator, alpinist, paraglider, environmentalist, photographer and Author, 1st person to circle the world in an ultralight without a copilot.
http://sl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matev%C5%BE_Lenar%C4%8Di%C4%8D - http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matev%C5%BE_Lenar%C4%8Di%C4%8D
1962 - Robert A. Rushworth, USAF major, takes the X-15 to an altitude of 30 600 metres.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Aviation/Historical_anniversaries/May_in_aviation
1962 – Continental Airlines Flight 11 boeing 707 crashes after bombs explode on board. FBI agents discovered that one of the passengers, Thomas G. Doty had purchased a life insurance policy for $150,000, the maximum available; his death would also bring in another $150,000 in additional insurance (some purchased at the airport) and death benefits. Investigators determined that Doty had purchased six sticks of dynamite for 29 cents each, shortly before the crash, and were able to deduce that a bomb had been placed in the used towel bin of the right rear lavatory.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_Airlines_Flight_11
1968 - Los Angeles Airways Flight 841 Sikorsky S-61L helicopter crashed Killing all 23 on board. The probable cause of the accident was a mechanical failure in the blade rotor system, which then allowed one blade to strike the side of the fuselage. The other four blades were then thrown out of balance and all five rotor blades broke and then the rear fuselage and tail separated from the rest of the airframe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles_Airways_Flight_841
1969 - Thomas Stafford & Eugene Cernan pilot the Apollo 10 15 km (9.4 mi) above lunar surface.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_10
1976 - NASA launches space vehicle S-179
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Aviation/Historical_anniversaries/May_in_aviation/May_22
1981 - Soyuz 40 is back on Earth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_40
1981 - 1st flight of The Gulfstream American Peregrine 600, American military trainer aircraft prototype.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulfstream_American_Peregrine
1982 - Launch of The Príncipe de Asturias (R-11), originally named Almirante Carrero Blanco, aircraft carrier, flagship of the Spanish Navy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_aircraft_carrier_Principe_de_Asturias
1983 - During an airshow at the Rhein-Main Air Base, a Canadian CF-104 Starfighter crashed onto a nearby road, hitting a car and killing all passengers, a vicar's family of 5. The pilot was able to eject.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadair_CF-104_Starfighter#Accidents_and_incidents
1988 - Death of Edgar Charles Johnston, Australian WWI fighter ace and leading member in civil aviation in Australia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Johnston - http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/australi/johnston1.php
1990 - The German Luftwaffe flies the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter for the last time before it is withdrawn from service; the airplane was nicknamed "the widow-maker" because of its terrible safety record - in its five years of service, 110 Starfighter pilots were killed.
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_F-104
2001 - Death of Patricia Consolatrix Hilliard Robertson, American physician and a NASA astronaut, in Houston from burn injuries sustained in the crash of a private plane at Wolfe Air Park, Manvel, Texas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patricia_Robertson
2002 - 1st flight of The Boeing X-45, American unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV), concept demonstrator for a next generation of completely autonomous military aircraft.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-45
2007 - Skybus Airlines, American low-cost carrier, begin operations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skybus_Airlines
2010 - Air India Express Flight 812, Boeing 737-8NG, overshot the runway on landing, fell over a cliff and caught fire, spreading wreckage across the surrounding hillside. Of the 160 passengers and six crew members on board, only eight passengers survived.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_India_Express_Flight_812
2012 - Launch of Dragon C2+, also known as SpaceX COTS Demo Flight 2 (COTS 2), 2nd test-flight for SpaceX's uncrewed Dragon cargo spacecraft.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COTS_Demo_Flight_2
2013 - Solar Impulse takes off from Phoenix for the longest leg (to Dallas) of the flight across america.