Airplane History
The thought of flying has been every mankind’s ultimate dream even before airplanes were invented. Before the invention and development, men and women tried to navigate the air by imitating the birds and its wings. They built machines with flapping wings and for some time, the idea worked. However, the flapping wings only worked for a bird-scale than it does at much larger scale to lift man and machine off the ground.
In 1783, few aeronauts discovered the art of uncontrolled flying with air balloons, which harder than expected, it was difficult to navigate and go to one place to the other unless the wind was blowing the desired direction. Until the turn of the 19th century, an English baronet from Yorkshire invented a flying machine with fixed wings, a repulsion system and movable control surface which eventually became the fundamental concept of the airplane. Sir George Cayley built the first true airplane which evolved through time and became the amazing machines that have taken mankind to the edge of space at speed of light.
In 1899, the Wright Brother’s designed their first aircraft, a small biplane glider flown as a kite to test their solution for controlling the aircraft by wing warping; a method of arching the wingtips slightly to control the aircraft’s rolling motion and balance. Over the next three years, Wilbur and Orville Wright would design a series of gliders which would be flown in both unmanned and piloted flights. They went over the earlier works of Cayley, Langley and Otto Lilienthal and soon recognized that the control and navigation would be the most crucial and hardest problem to solve.
In 1900, the Wright Brothers successfully flew their 50-pound biplane glider with its 17-foot wingspan and wing warping mechanism in both unmanned and piloted flights. Based upon the good results, they planned to refine the controls and landing gear, and build a bigger glider. The brothers built a movable track to help launch the Flyer which was a downhill track that would help the aircraft gain enough airspeed to fly. Orville Wright took the Flyer for a 12-second, sustained flight on December 17, 1903. This was the first successful, powered piloted flight in history. The first engine-powered airplane to fly was Kitty Hawk by the Wright Brothers.
As progression went on, the flight became a global phenomenon which resulted to more gliders, airplanes, jets, biplanes, helicopters and the like. Armed forces and military groups of all nations patronized these machineries as weapons, transportation and such.
Airplane History provides reliable data, photographs, videos and stories of different kinds of aircrafts from A to Z, from aircrafts from the First World War, Second World War, army and military aircrafts to commercial airplanes, jets, helicopters and those of civilian use. Airplane History contains a wide range of information in forms of historical data and write-ups, short videos with brief descriptions and overviews, gallery of photographs, and personal stories from pilots and aviation enthusiasts as well.