DEC27

1919 - Birth of Charles W. Sweeney, USAAF WWII pilot and the pilot who flew the "Fat Man" atomic bomb to Nagasaki.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_W._Sweeney

1922 - 1st purpose built aircraft carrier to be commissioned in the world is the Japanese Hosho.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_H%C5%8Dsh%C5%8D

1926 - A de Havilland DH.66 Hercules, British seven-passenger, three-engined airliner, starts an inaugural flight from Croydon UK to Delhi, India.

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

1935 - USAAC uses aerial bombardment to divert a flow of lava from Mauna Loa, Hawaii that is threatening Hilo's waterworks.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Aviation/Historical_anniversaries/December_in_aviation/December_27

1936 - 1st flight of The Petlyakov Pe-8, only Soviet 4 engine heavy bomber built during WWII.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petlyakov_Pe-8

1936 - United Airlines Trip 34 Boeing 247D crashed at the head of Rice Canyon killing all 12. The probable cause was found to be "...an error on the part of the pilot for attempting to fly through Newhall pass at an altitude lower than the surrounding mountains without first determining by radio the existing weather".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Trip_34

1942 - 1st flight of The Mitsubishi Ki-67 Hiryu 'Peggy', Japanese twin-engine medium bomber.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitsubishi_Ki-67

1942 - 1st flight of The Kawanishi N1K1-J Shiden 'George', Japanese fighter, Evolution of the N1K1 prototype.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kawanishi_N1K

1942 - Death of Konstantin Vladimirovich Solovev, Soviet Winter war and WWII flying ace, killed in action in his I-153.

http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/soviet_solovyov.htm

1942 - 1st flight of The Northrop N-9M, one-third scale aircraft used for the development of the Northrop XB-35 and YB-35 Flying Wing long-range bomber program

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_N-9M

1943 - Death of Nakakazu Ozaki, Japanese WWII fighter ace, colliding in mid-air with a fighter attacking the bombers he was escorting near Suichuan airfield.

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%B0%BE%E5%B4%8E%E4%B8%AD%E5%92%8C - http://www.cieldegloire.com/010_ozaki_n.php

1945 - 1st flight of the Heinkel He 274, German heavy bomber prototype designed for high-altitude bombing with pressurized crew accommodation, finally completed just after WWII by the Ateliers Aéronautiques de Suresnes (AAS) and named AAS 01A.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_274#Abandoned_prototypes

1947 - Air India Douglas DC-3 crashed shortly after takeoff from Karachi due to Poor visibility and malfunctioning instrument in the cockpit, Killing all 23

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1947_Korangi_Creek_crash

1947 - Death of Johannes Winkler, German rocket pioneer who founded the 1st German rocket society and launched the 1st successful liquid-fuelled rocket in Europe

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

1947 - 1st flight of the 2nd Heinkel He 274, German heavy bomber prototype designed for high-altitude bombing with pressurized crew accommodation, finally completed just after WWII by the Ateliers Aéronautiques de Suresnes (AAS) and named AAS 01B.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_274#Abandoned_prototypes

1951 - 1st flight of The North American FJ-2/-3 Fury, American swept-wing carrier-capable fighters for the US Navy and USMC, based on the United States Air Force's F-86 Sabre

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_FJ-2/-3_Fury

1952 - The de Havilland Comet 1A made its initial proving flight from Paris to Dakar.

http://www.aviastar.org/gallery/foto.php?dir=108

1954 - 1st flight of the SFECMAS 1402 'Gerfaut' 1B, French delta-wing turbojet experimental research aircraft.

http://www.aviafrance.com/aviafrance1.php?ID=7201

1968 - North Central Airlines Flight 458 Convair CV-580 crashed into a hangar while attempting a night landing in poor weather at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois, Killing 27 over 45 on board ond one on ground.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Central_Airlines_Flight_458

1968 - Apollo 8 is back on earth, (Frank F. Borman II, James A. Lovell Jr. and William A. Anders) 2nd manned mission in the American Apollo space program, 1st human spaceflight to leave Earth orbit, 1st to be captured by and escape from the gravitational field of another celestial body and 1st crewed voyage to return to Earth from another celestial body—Earth's Moon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_8

1970 - Birth of Naoko Yamazaki, japanese engineer and JAXA astronaut.

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

1978 - 1st flight of the Enstrom F-280 L Hawk, American small, light piston-engined helicopter prototype, four-seat version of the 280C.

http://www.aviastar.org/helicopters_eng/enstrom-28.php

1982 - Death of John Leonard 'Jack' Swigert, Jr., American test pilot and NASA astronaut, one of only 24 people to have flown to the Moon.

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

1992 - USAF F-16D Fighting Falcons shoot down an Iraqi Air Force Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 in Southern Iraq's "no fly zone"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_no-fly_zones

1998 - Death of Robert Samuel Johnson, American WWII flying ace.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_S._Johnson - http://cieldegloire.com/014_johnson_r_s.php

1999 - STS-103, Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission by Space Shuttle Discovery is back on earth

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

2006 - CHC Helicopter Eurocopter SA-365N Dauphin 2, on a carrying crew mission between the Millom and South Morecambe gas platforms, crashed into sea 24 miles from the shoreline of Morecambe Bay, Lancashire, killing all 7.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Morecambe_Bay_helicopter_crash

2006 - Launch of COROT (COnvection ROtation and planetary Transits), CNES/ESA space mission to search for extrasolar planets with short orbital periods, particularly those of large terrestrial size, and to perform asteroseismology by measuring solar-like oscillations in stars, 1st spacecraft dedicated to the detection of transiting extrasolar planets.

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