History of Aviation - First Flights History of Aviation - First Flights Registration Options Deregulation Economics Glossary Environment Airports ATC How They Fly History Safety Structure History of Aviation - First Flights On December 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright capped four years of research and design efforts with a 120-foot, 12-second flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina - the first powered flight in a heavier-than-air machine. Prior to that, people had flown only in balloons and gliders. The first person to fly as a passenger was Leon Delagrange, who rode with French pilot Henri Farman from a meadow outside of Paris in 1908. Charles Furnas became the first American airplane passenger when he flew with Orville Wright at Kitty Hawk later that year. History of Aviation - First Flights On December 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright capped four years of research and design efforts with a 120-foot, 12-second flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina - the first powered flight in a heavier-than-air machine. Prior to that, people had flown only in balloons and gliders.

The first person to fly as a passenger was Leon Delagrange, who rode with French pilot Henri Farman from a meadow outside of Paris in 1908. Charles Furnas became the first American airplane passenger when he flew with Orville Wright at Kitty Hawk later that year. History of Aviation First Flights On December 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright capped four years of research and design efforts with a 120-foot, 12-second flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina - the first powered flight in a heavier-than-air machine. Prior to that, people had flown only in balloons and gliders. The first person to fly as a passenger was Leon Delagrange, who rode with French pilot Henri Farman from a meadow outside of Paris in 1908. Charles Furnas became the first American airplane passenger when he flew with Orville Wright at Kitty Hawk later that year. The first scheduled air service began in Florida on January 1, 1914.

Glenn Curtiss had designed a plane that could take off and land on water and thus could be built larger than any plane to date, because it did not need the heavy undercarriage required for landing on hard ground. Thomas Benoist, an auto parts maker, decided to build such a flying boat, or seaplane, for a service across Tampa Bay called the St. Petersburg - Tampa Air Boat Line. His first passenger was ex-St. Petersburg Mayor A.C. Pheil, who made the 18-mile trip in 23 minutes, a considerable improvement over the two-hour trip by boat. The single-plane service accommodated one passenger at a time, and the company charged a one-way fare of $5. After operating two flights a day for four months, the company folded with the end of the winter tourist season. World War I These and other early flights were headline events, but commercial aviation was very slow to catch on with the general public, most of whom were afraid to ride in the new flying machines. Improvements in aircraft design also were slow.

However, with the advent of World War I, the military value of aircraft was quickly recognized and production increased significantly to meet the soaring demand for planes from governments on both sides of the Atlantic. Most significant was the development of more powerful motors, enabling aircraft to reach speeds of up to 130 miles per hour, more than twice the speed of pre-war aircraft. Increased power also made larger aircraft possible. At the same time, the war was bad for commercial aviation in several respects. It focused all design and production efforts on building military aircraft. In the public's mind, flying became associated with bombing runs, surveillance and aerial dogfights. In addition, there was such a large surplus of planes at the end of the war that the demand for new production was almost nonexistent for several years - and many aircraft builders went bankrupt. Some European countries, such as Great Britain and France, nurtured commercial aviation by starting air service over the English Channel. However, nothing similar occurred in the United States, where there were no such natural obstacles isolating major cities and where railroads could transport people almost as fast as an airplane, and in considerably more comfort. The salvation of the U.S.

commercial aviation industry following World War I was a government program, but one that had nothing to do with the transportation of people. Airmail By 1917, the U.S. government felt enough progress had been made in the development of planes to warrant something totally new - the transport of mail by air. That year, Congress appropriated $100,000 for an experimental airmail service to be conducted jointly by the Army and the Post Office between Washington and New York, with an intermediate stop in Philadelphia. The first flight left Belmont Park, Long Island for Philadelphia on May 14, 1918 and the next day continued on to Washington, where it was met by President Woodrow Wilson. With a large number of war-surplus aircraft in hand, the Post Office set its sights on a far more ambitious goal - transcontinental air service. It opened the first segment, between Chicago and Cleveland, on May 15, 1919 and completed the air route on September 8, 1920, when the most difficult part of the route, the Rocky Mountains, was spanned.

Airplanes still could not fly at night when the service first began, so the mail was handed off to trains at the end of each day. Nonetheless, by using airplanes the Post Office was able to shave 22 hours off coast-to-coast mail deliveries. Beacons In 1921, the Army deployed rotating beacons in a line between Columbus and Dayton, Ohio, a distance of about 80 miles. The beacons, visible to pilots at 10-second intervals, made it possible to fly the route at night. The Post Office took over the operation of the guidance system the following year, and by the end of 1923, constructed similar beacons between Chicago and Cheyenne, Wyoming, a line later extended coast-to-coast at a cost of $550,000. Mail then could be delivered across the continent in as little as 29 hours eastbound and 34 hours westbound - prevailing winds from west to east accounted for the difference which was at least two days less than it took by train.

The Contract Air Mail Act of 1925 By the mid-1920s, the Post Office mail fleet was flying 2.5 million miles and delivering 14 million letters annually. However, the government had no intention of continuing airmail service on its own. Traditionally, the Post Office had used private companies for the transportation of mail. So, once the feasibility of airmail was firmly established and airline facilities were in place, the government moved to transfer airmail service to the private sector, by way of competitive bids. The legislative authority for the move was the Contract Air Mail Act of 1925, commonly referred to as the Kelly Act after its chief sponsor, Rep. Clyde Kelly of Pennsylvania. This was the first major step toward the creation of a private U.S. airline industry. Winners of the initial five contracts were National Air Transport (owned by the Curtiss Aeroplane Co.), Varney Air Lines, Western Air Express, Colonial Air Transport and Robertson Aircraft Corporation. National and Varney would later become important parts of United Air Lines (originally a joint venture of the Boeing Airplane Company and Pratt & Whitney).

Western would merge with Transcontinental Air Transport (TAT), another Curtiss subsidiary, to form Transcontinental and Western Air (TWA). Robertson would become part of the Universal Aviation Corporation, which in turn would merge with Colonial, Southern Air Transport and others, to form American Airways, predecessor of American Airlines. Juan Trippe, one of the original partners in Colonial, later pioneered international air travel with Pan Am - a carrier he founded in 1927 to transport mail between Key West, Florida, and Havana, Cuba. Pitcairn Aviation, yet another Curtiss subsidiary that got its start transporting mail, would become Eastern Air Transport, predecessor of Eastern Air Lines. The Morrow Board The same year Congress passed the Contract Air Mail Act, President Calvin Coolidge appointed a board to recommend a national aviation policy (a much-sought-after goal of then Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover). Dwight Morrow, a senior partner in J.P. Morgan's bank, and later the father-in-law of Charles Lindbergh, was named chairman. The board heard testimony from 99 people, and on November 30, 1925, submitted its report to President Coolidge.

The report was wide-ranging, but its key recommendation was that the government should set standards for civil aviation and that the standards should be set outside of the military. The Air Commerce Act of 1926 Congress adopted the recommendations of the Morrow Board almost to the letter in the Air Commerce Act of 1926. The legislation authorized the Secretary of Commerce to designate air routes, to develop air navigation systems, to license pilots and aircraft, and to investigate accidents. The act brought the government into commercial aviation as regulator of the private airlines spawned by the Kelly Act of the previous year. Congress also adopted the board's recommendation for airmail contracting, by amending the Kelly Act to change the method of compensation for airmail services. Instead of paying carriers a percentage of the postage paid, the government would pay them according to the weight of the mail. This simplified payments, and proved highly advantageous to the carriers, which collected $48 million from the government for the carriage of mail between 1926 and 1931.

Ford's Tin Goose Henry Ford, the automobile manufacturer, was also among the early successful bidders for airmail contracts, winning the right, in 1925, to carry mail from Chicago to Detroit and Cleveland aboard planes his company already was using to transport spare parts for his automobile assembly plants. More importantly, he jumped into aircraft manufacturing, and in 1927, produced the Ford Trimotor, commonly referred to as the Tin Goose. It was one of the first all-metal planes, made of a new material, duralumin, which was almost as light as aluminum but twice as strong. It also was the first plane designed primarily to carry passengers rather than mail. The Ford Trimotor had 12 passenger seats; a cabin high enough for a passenger to walk down the aisle without stooping; and room for a "stewardess," or flight attendant, the first of whom were nurses, hired by United in 1930 to serve meals and assist airsick passengers. The Tin Goose's three engines made it possible to fly higher and faster (up to 130 miles per hour), and its sturdy appearance, combined with the Ford name, had a reassuring effect on the public's perception of flying.

However, it was another event, in 1927, that brought unprecedented public attention to aviation and helped secure the industry's future as a major mode of transportation. Charles Lindbergh At 7:52 a.m. on May 20, 1927, a young pilot named Charles Lindbergh set out on an historic flight across the Atlantic Ocean, from New York to Paris. It was the first trans-Atlantic non-stop flight in an airplane, and its effect on both Lindbergh and aviation was enormous. Lindbergh became an instant American hero. Aviation became a more established industry, attracting millions of private investment dollars almost overnight, as well as the support of millions of Americans. The pilot who sparked all of this attention had dropped out of engineering school at the University of Wisconsin to learn how to fly. He became a barnstormer, doing aerial shows across the country, and eventually joined the Robertson Aircraft Corporation, to transport mail between St. Louis and Chicago. In planning his trans-Atlantic voyage, Lindbergh daringly decided to fly by himself, without a navigator, so he could carry more fuel. His plane, the Spirit of St.

Louis, was slightly less than 28 feet in length, with a wingspan of 46 feet. It carried 450 gallons of gasoline, which comprised half its takeoff weight. There was too little room in the cramped cockpit for navigating by the stars, so Lindbergh flew by dead reckoning. He divided maps from his local library into thirty-three 100-mile segments, noting the heading he would follow as he flew each segment. When he first sighted the coast of Ireland, he was almost exactly on the route he had plotted, and he landed several hours later, with 80 gallons of fuel to spare. Lindbergh's greatest enemy on his journey was fatigue. The trip took an exhausting 33 hours, 29 minutes and 30 seconds, but he managed to keep awake by sticking his head out the window to inhale cold air, by holding his eyelids open, and by constantly reminding himself that if he fell asleep he would perish. In addition, he had a slight instability built into his airplane that helped keep him focused and awake. Lindbergh landed at Le Bourget Field, outside of Paris, at 10:24 p.m.

Paris time on May 21. Word of his flight preceded him and a large crowd of Parisians rushed out to the airfield to see him and his little plane. There was no question about the magnitude of what he had accomplished. The Air Age had arrived. The Watres Act and the Spoils Conference In 1930, Postmaster General Walter Brown pushed for legislation that would have another major impact on the development of commercial aviation. Known as the Watres Act (after one of its chief sponsors, Rep. Laurence H. Watres of Pennsylvania), it authorized the Post Office to enter into longer-term contracts for airmail, with rates based on space or volume, rather than weight. In addition, the act authorized the Post Office to consolidate airmail routes, where it was in the national interest to do so. Brown believed the changes would promote larger, stronger airlines, as well as more coast-to-coast and nighttime service. Immediately after Congress approved the act, Brown held a series of meetings in Washington to discuss the new contracts. The meetings were later dubbed the Spoils Conference because Brown gave them little publicity and directly invited only a handful of people from the larger airlines.

He designated three transcontinental mail routes and made it clear that he wanted only one company operating each service rather than a number of small airlines handing the mail off to one another. His actions brought political trouble that resulted in major changes to the system two years later. Scandal and the Air Mail Act of 1934 Following the Democratic landslide in the election of 1932, some of the smaller airlines began complaining to news reporters and politicians that they had been unfairly denied airmail contracts by Brown. One reporter discovered that a major contract had been awarded to an airline whose bid was three times higher than a rival bid from a smaller airline. Congressional hearings followed, chaired by Sen. Hugo Black of Alabama, and by 1934 the scandal had reached such proportions as to prompt President Franklin Roosevelt to cancel all mail contracts and turn mail deliveries over to the Army. The decision was a mistake. The Army pilots were unfamiliar with the mail routes, and the weather at the time they took over the deliveries, February 1934, was terrible.

There were a number of accidents as the pilots flew practice runs and began carrying the mail, leading to newspaper headlines that forced President Roosevelt to retreat from his plan only a month after he had turned the mail over to the Army By means of the Air Mail Act of 1934, the government once again returned airmail transportation to the private sector, but it did so under a new set of rules that would have a significant impact on the industry. Bidding was structured to be more competitive, and former contract holders were not allowed to bid at all, so many companies were reorganized. The result was a more even distribution of the government's mail business and lower mail rates that forced airlines and aircraft manufacturers to pay more attention to the development of the passenger side of the business. In another major change, the government forced the dismantling of the vertical holding companies common up to that time in the industry, sending aircraft manufacturers and airline operators (most notably Boeing, Pratt & Whitney, and United Air Lines) their separate ways. The entire industry was now reorganized and refocused. Aircraft Innovations For the airlines to attract passengers away from the railroads, they needed both larger and faster airplanes. They also needed safer airplanes.

Accidents, such as the one in 1931 that killed Notre Dame Football Coach Knute Rockne along with six others, kept people from flying Aircraft manufacturers responded to the challenge. There were so many improvements to aircraft in the 1930s that many believe it was the most innovative period in aviation history. Air-cooled engines replaced water-cooled engines, reducing weight and making larger and faster planes possible. Cockpit instruments also improved, with better altimeters, airspeed indicators, rate-of-climb indicators, compasses, and the introduction of artificial horizon, which showed pilots the attitude of the aircraft relative to the ground - important for flying in reduced visibility Radio Another development of enormous importance to aviation was radio. Aviation and radio developed almost in lock step. Marconi sent his first message across the Atlantic on the airwaves just two years before the Wright Brothers? first flight at Kitty Hawk. By World War I, some pilots were taking radios up in the air with them so they could communicate with people on the ground.

The airlines followed suit after the war, using radio to transmit weather information from the ground to their pilots, so they could avoid storms An even more significant development, however, was the realization that radio could be used as an aid to navigation when visibility was poor and visual navigation aids, such as beacons, were useless. Once technical problems were worked out, the Department of Commerce constructed 83 radio beacons across the country. They became fully operational in 1932, automatically transmitting directional beams, or tracks, that pilots could follow to their destination. Marker beacons came next, allowing pilots to locate airports in poor visibility. The first air traffic control tower was established in 1935 at what is now Newark International Airport in New Jersey The First Modern Airliners Boeing built what generally is considered the first modern passenger airliner, the Boeing 247. It was unveiled in 1933, and United Air Lines promptly bought 60 of them. Based on a low-wing, twin-engine bomber with retractable landing gear built for the military, the 247 accommodated 10 passengers and cruised at 155 miles per hour.

Its cabin was insulated, to reduce engine noise levels inside the plane, and it featured such amenities as upholstered seats and a hot water heater to make flying more comfortable to passengers. Eventually, Boeing also gave the 247 variable-pitch propellers, that reduced takeoff distances, increased the rate of climb, and boosted cruising speeds Not to be outdone by United, TWA went searching for an alternative to the 247 and eventually found what it wanted from the Douglas Aircraft Company. Its DC-1 incorporated Boeing's innovations and improved upon many of them. The DC-1 had a more powerful engine and accommodations for two more passengers than did the 247. More importantly, the airframe was designed so that the skin of the aircraft bore most of the stress on the plane during flight. There was no interior skeleton of metal spars, thus giving passengers more room than they had in the 247.The DC-1 also was easier to fly. It was equipped with the first automatic pilot and the first efficient wing flaps, for added lift during takeoff. However, for all its advancements, only one DC-1 was ever built.

Douglas decided almost immediately to alter its design, adding 18 inches to its length so it could accommodate two more passengers. The new, longer version was called the DC-2 and it was a big success, but the best was still to come The DC-3 Called the plane that changed the world, the DC-3 was the first aircraft to enable airlines to make money carrying passengers. As a result, it quickly became the dominant aircraft in the United States, following its debut in 1936 with American Airlines (which played a key role in its design). The DC-3 had 50 percent greater passenger capacity than the DC-2 (21 seats versus 14), yet cost only ten percent more to operate. It also was considered a safer plane, built of an aluminum alloy stronger than materials previously used in aircraft construction. It had more powerful engines (1,000 horsepower versus 710 horsepower for the DC-2), and it could travel coast to coast in only 16 hours - a fast trip for that time. Another important improvement was the use of a hydraulic pump to lower and raise the landing gear. This freed pilots from having to crank the gear up and down during takeoffs and landings.

For greater passenger comfort, the DC-3 had a noise-deadening plastic insulation, and seats set in rubber to minimize vibrations. It was a fantastically popular airplane, and it helped attract many new travelers to flying. Pressurized Cabins Although planes such as the Boeing 247 and the DC-3 represented significant advances in aircraft design, they had a major drawback. They could fly no higher than 10,000 feet, because people became dizzy and even fainted, due to the reduced levels of oxygen at higher altitudes. The airlines wanted to fly higher, to get above the air turbulence and storms common at lower altitudes. Motion sickness was a problem for many airline passengers, and an inhibiting factor to the industry's growth. The breakthrough came at Boeing with the Stratoliner, a derivation of the B-17 bomber introduced in 1940 and first flown by TWA. It was the first pressurized aircraft, meaning that air was pumped into the aircraft as it gained altitude to maintain an atmosphere inside the cabin similar to the atmosphere that occurs naturally at lower altitudes.

With its regulated air compressor, the 33-seat Stratoliner could fly as high as 20,000 feet and reach speeds of 200 miles per hour. The Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 Government decisions continued to prove as important to aviation's future as technological breakthroughs, and one of the most important aviation bills ever enacted by Congress was the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938. Until that time, numerous government agencies and departments had a hand in aviation policy. Airlines sometimes were pushed and pulled in several directions, and there was no central agency working for the long-term development of the industry. All the airlines had been losing money, since the postal reforms in 1934 significantly reduced the amount they were paid for carrying the mail. The airlines wanted more rationalized government regulation, through an independent agency, and the Civil Aeronautics Act gave them what they needed. It created the Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA) and gave the new agency power to regulate airline fares, airmail rates, interline agreements, mergers and routes.

Its mission was to preserve order in the industry, holding rates to reasonable levels while, at the same time nurturing the still financially-shaky airline industry, thereby encouraging the development of commercial air transportation. Congress created a separate agency - the Air Safety Board - to investigate accidents. In 1940, however, President Roosevelt convinced Congress to transfer the accident investigation function to the CAA, which was then renamed the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB). These moves, coupled with the tremendous progress made on the technological side, put the industry on the road to success. World War II Aviation had an enormous impact on the course of World War II and the war had just as significant an impact on aviation. There were fewer than 300 air transport aircraft in the United States when Hitler marched into Poland in 1939. By the end of the war, U.S. aircraft manufacturers were producing 50,000 planes a year. Most of the planes, of course, were fighters and bombers, but the importance of air transports to the war effort quickly became apparent as well. Throughout the war, the airlines provided much needed airlift to keep troops and supplies moving, to the front and throughout the production chain back home.

For the first time in their history, the airlines had far more business - for passengers as well as freight - than they could handle. Many of them also had opportunities to pioneer new routes, gaining an exposure that would give them a decidedly broader outlook at war's end. While there were numerous advances in U.S. aircraft design during the war, that enabled planes to go faster, higher, and farther than ever before, mass production was the chief goal of the United States. The major innovations of the wartime period - radar and jet engines - occurred in Europe. The Jet Engine Isaac Newton was the first to theorize, in the 18th century, that a rearward-channeled explosion could propel a machine forward at a great rate of speed. However, no one found a practical application for the theory until Frank Whittle, a British pilot, designed the first jet engine in 1930. Even then, widespread skepticism about the commercial viability of a jet prevented Whittle's design from being tested for several years. The Germans were the first to build and test a jet aircraft.

Based on a design by Hans von Ohain, a student whose work was independent of Whittle's, it flew in 1939, although not as well as the Germans had hoped. It would take another five years for German scientists to perfect the design, by which time it was, fortunately, too late to affect the outcome of the war. Whittle also improved his jet engine during the war, and in 1942 he shipped an engine prototype to General Electric in the United States. America's first jet plane - the Bell P-59 - was built the following year. Radar Another technological development with a much greater impact on the war's outcome (and later on commercial aviation) was radar. British scientists had been working on a device that could give them early warning of approaching enemy aircraft even before the war began, and by 1940 Britain had a line of radar transceivers along its east coast that could detect German aircraft the moment they took off from the Continent. British scientists also perfected the cathode ray oscilloscope, which produced map-type outlines of surrounding countryside and showed aircraft as a pulsing light.

Americans, meanwhile, found a way to distinguish between enemy aircraft and allied aircraft by installing transponders aboard the latter that signaled their identity to radar operators. Dawn of the Jet Age Aviation was poised to advance rapidly following the war, in large part because of the development of jets, but there still were significant problems to overcome. In 1952, a 36-seat British-made jet, the Comet, flew from London to Johannesburg, South Africa, at speeds as high as 500 miles per hour. Two years later, the Comet's career ended abruptly following two back-to-back accidents in which the fuselage burst apart during flight - the result of metal fatigue. The Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, following World War II, helped secure the funding needed to solve such problems and advance the jet's development. Most of the breakthroughs related to military aircraft that later were applied to the commercial sector. For example, Boeing employed a swept-back wing design for its B-47 and B-52 bombers to reduce drag and increase speed. Later, the design was incorporated into commercial jets, making them faster and thus more attractive to passengers.

The best example of military - civilian technology transfer was the jet tanker Boeing designed for the Air Force to refuel bombers in flight. The tanker, the KC-135, was a huge success as a military plane, but even more successful when revamped and introduced, in 1958, as the first U.S. passenger jet, the Boeing 707. With a length of 125 feet and four engines with 17,000 pounds of thrust each, the 707 could carry up to 181 passengers and travel at speeds of 550 miles per hour. Its engines proved more reliable than piston-driven engines - producing less vibration, putting less stress on the plane's airframe and reducing maintenance expenses. They also burned kerosene, which cost half as much as the high-octane gasoline used in more traditional planes. With the 707, first ordered and operated by Pan Am, all questions about the commercial feasibility of jets were answered. The Jet Age had arrived, and other airlines soon were lining up to buy the new aircraft.

The Federal Aviation Act of 1958 Following World War II, air travel soared, but with the industry's growth came new problems. In 1956 two aircraft collided over the Grand Canyon, killing 128 people. The skies were getting too crowded for existing systems of aircraft separation, and Congress responded by passing the Federal Aviation Act of 1958. The legislation created a new safety regulatory agency, the Federal Aviation Agency, later called the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) when Congress created the Department of Transportation (DOT) in 1967. The agency was charged with establishing and running a broad air traffic control system, to maintain safe separation of all commercial aircraft through all phases of flight. In addition, it assumed jurisdiction over all other aviation safety matters, such as the certification of aircraft designs, and airline training and maintenance programs. The Civil Aeronautics Board retained jurisdiction over economic matters, such as airline routes and rates. Wide-bodies and Supersonics 1969 marked the debut of another revolutionary aircraft, the Boeing 747, which, again, Pan Am was the first to purchase and fly in commercial service.

It was the first wide-body jet, with two aisles, a distinctive upper deck over the front section of the fuselage, and four engines. With seating for as many as 450 passengers, it was twice as big as any other Boeing jet and 80 percent bigger than the largest jet up until that time, the DC-8. Recognizing the economies of scale to be gained from larger jets, other aircraft manufacturers quickly followed suit. Douglas built its first wide-body, the DC-10, in 1970, and only a month later, Lockheed flew its contender in the wide-body market, the L-1011. Both of these jets had three engines (one under each wing and one on the tail) and were smaller than the 747, seating about 250 passengers. During the same period of time, efforts were underway in both the United States and Europe to build a supersonic commercial aircraft. The Soviet Union was the first to succeed, testing the Tupolev 144 in December of 1968.

A consortium of West European aircraft manufacturers first flew the Concorde two months later and eventually produced a number of those fast, but small, jets for commercial service. U.S. efforts to produce a supersonic passenger jet, on the other hand, stalled in 1971 due to public concern about it's expense and the sonic boom produced by such aircraft. Navigate Aviation History commercial jet aviation commercial jet aviation cruise missiles commercial jet aviation The effect of the war was to telescope decades of development in aviationï¿½in materials and structure, navigation and communication, flight procedures and ground supportï¿½into half a decade. There was, at this point, nothing unusual about flying, even if the experience of flight did not get any less unsettling. It was clear that landing mechanisms and procedures developed during the war had made the flying boats unnecessary; the luxuriant British Saunders-Roe ï¿½Saroï¿½ Princess flying boat was obsolete the day it was unveiled in 1952. The importance to a city of having an international airport nearby caused city governments to build striking airports as a stimulus to business and as symbols of status.

At first, airlines used converted and enhanced World War II planes and pre-war models, such as the Douglas DC-3s (which flew in the war as the C-47 transport), and the four-engined Lockheed Constellation (the ï¿½Connieï¿½) and the less refined, but still serviceable DC-4. Boeing developed a four-engine competitor to the Connie based on the B-29 Superfortress, the Boeing 377 Stratocruiser, and Lockheed came back with the Super Constellation in 1950. The two major builders of aircraft for commercial aviation were Douglasï¿½which produced the Iegendary twenty-one-passenger DC-3 and the DC-4 (Above). with a seating capacity of forty ï¿½ and Lockheed, manufacturers of the Constellation series, including the C-12 I (Below, which became President Eisenhowerï¿½s official plane (Roosevelt and Truman had used Douglas planes). Boeing was a distant third at the warï¿½s end with the 377 Stratocruiser (adapted from the B-29 bomber).

The three companies established the United States as the leader of post-war civilian aircraft production. This gave the United States three sizeable prop aircraft, richly appointed with comfort and convenience, yet with sizeable passenger loads, which met the newly-created demand for long- distance air travel. Great Britain, after some careful but misguided analysis by the Brabazon Committee, which met during the war to plan postwar development of commercial aviation, countered by plunging into the development of jet-powered commercial airliners. The first offering, the Vickers Viscount, a turboprop, was popular with carriers for short distances. Two other efforts inspired by the Brabazon recommendationsï¿½the Saro Princess and the Bristol Brabazon, an ambitious attempt at creating a huge turbojet that had to be abandoned after eight years of fruitless developmentï¿½were not as fortunate. The problem seems to have been that the Brabazon Committee tried to guess what the market would be like a decade hence and to plan accordingly. The American approach was to listen to what the market was saying right now and meet those needs. The result was that the British kept building aircraft no one asked for, while the seats on the American planes were full.

When the British did create a fully jet-powered passenger aircraft, the de Havilland Comet, it was a sleek, elegantly streamlined and appointed four-engine plane with a respectable passenger load. The first Comet model was put in service in 1949, and it went through four models, each lengthening the fuselage to allow a larger passenger load. Britainï¿½s entry into the high-stakes long-distance sweepstakes was the de Havilland D.H. 106 Comet, a jet aircraft of incomparable design and performance that was years ahead of its time when unveiled in 1952. Were it not for a fatal flaw, which was known by both the manufacturers and the British government, it might have established England as a major manufacturer of large jet transports In 1954 two of the earlier models crashed in the Mediterranean and service on the plane was suspended. An investigation determined that the problem lay in metal fatigue around the square- cut windows, a problem easily correctable, but the shock caused by the crashes could not be so easily assuaged and the entire program was put on hold while new fuselages could be designed with round window holes.

By always looking to develop its planes further, Douglas stayed in the forefront of the market in the years following the war. Here, four generations of Douglas airliners are parked at the Douglas factory in Santa Monica, California (from the rear): the DC-3, the four-engine DC-4, the DC-6, and the DC-7, the last of the prop line. At the time, the United States enjoyed 80 percent of the commercial airplane market and more than half of that was from the Douglas Company. The DC-6 had replaced the DC-4 and it was in turn replaced by the DC-7, the definitive prop model of the line. Donald Douglas watched and waited to see how the Comet fiasco would be resolved before leaping into jet transport. This was the opening Boeing was looking for. In 1954 Boeing introduced its new passenger jet aircraft, the Boeing 707, an airplane that used the same basic design specifications as the B-52 the company was building for the U.S. Air Force. The initial reaction to the 707 was not enthusiastic; its first orders were not received until a year after the prototype was unveiled.

But with the support of a large order from Pan Am, by the time the 707 began commercial service in 1959, the orders had rolled in, and Boeing took the lead in the market. Douglas countered with the DC- 8, and the Convair Company entered the market with the 880/990 series built for Delta Airlines and TWA, but neither could shake Boeingï¿½s dominance of the market. Europeans remained a step behind the American manufacturers, creating the Vickers Viscount, a turboprop that had wide use as a short-haul airliner. A new generation of jet airliners arrived in 1963 using the fuel-saving technology of the turbofan engine; again Boeing led the way with the Boeing 727, the most successful series of passenger jetliners of the past fifty years. The 707/727 not only has outsold any other single model, but also has been adapted into the most number of models (more than a thousand) and applications of any commercial jet in history.

Not being able to compete with Boeing and Douglas in the long- haul market, other builders in the 1950s looked to create better airplanes for the short-haul carriers. Several models produced in Europe and the United States found popular support in the market: the much admired French Caravelle, based on the Comet fuselage but with engines attached to the rear of the fuselage and not built into the wing (which was both a positive and a negative for the Comet); the British Aerospace Corporationï¿½s BAC 111 and its close rival, the DC-9; and the Boeing 737. Two aircraft that proved popular for very short trips and for commuter routes were the Fokker F-27 Friendship, produced under license after 1955 by Fairchild, and the de Havilland Twin Otter. In 1969 Boeing again struck out into the unknown by producing the 747 Jumbo Jet, a wide-body commercial jet based on a Boeing military aircraft proposal (not realised), the C-S Galaxy, and powered by four Pratt & Whitney JT9D turbofan engines.

This time, Boeing was so certain of its reception in the market that it did not bother with a prototype but used its first production models for test flights. Boeing 747 The 747 can seat five hundred passengers, though it usually holds 385. It cruises at about six hundred miles per hour (965.Skph) and has a nonstop range of seventy-two hundred miles (11,585km). It often is designed to have a forward first-class (or ï¿½business classï¿½) section and a second level on which the cockpit and a lounge are located. The 747 is an expensive airplane, and the cost overruns on the engines, borne by Boeing, nearly bankrupted the company. But twenty-five years of service have proven it to be a durable plane, and it has paid the airlines that use itï¿½and thus Boeingï¿½handsome returns.

The Fokker F-27 Friendship, a fifty-passenger short-distance aircraft, remained in production longer than virtually any other commercial airplane Boeingï¿½s chief American rivals, Lockheed and McDonnell Douglas (the amalgamated company taking shape in 1967), responded to the 747 with large planes of their own. The Lockheed L-1O1 1 Tritar is a somewhat smaller airplane (four hundred-passenger limit) with three Rolls-Royce turbofan engines. The long-distance market belonged to Boeing, makers of the 707, which was produced in the most designations and for more applications (here, as an in-flight refueller) than any other airplane. (The cost overruns of the L-lO1 1 engines bankrupted Rolls-Royce.) The McDonnell Douglas DC-10 is smaller still and uses three General Electric turbofan engines. Although cheaper than the 747, these planes have never mounted a serious challenge to Boeingï¿½s dominance in the passenger airline market. The only rival that has emerged is the Airbus A300 series, built by a consortium of French, British, and German government and industrial interests.

Smarting from having lost the early rounds in the commercial airplane building market, BAC and the French firm Aï¿½rospatiale joined forces in 1962 and planned a supersonic transport (SST) to be called the Concorde. Douglas DC 10 Americans had been through this before with the Brabazon Committee, and they settled back to watch. Their studies indicated that without large government support, the market would not make an SST profitable, and lengthy hearings in the U.S. Congress indicated that such support was not forthcoming. American builders also anticipated protest from environmentalists over noise and air pollution that would result from any SST. The Concorde was built (there are actually fourteen models in existence, with rarely more than two in use at any one time), and, as predicted, it failed to make anything close to a profit. Boeing 777 The French and British governments maintained the service strictly for the prestige value, finally terminating in October 2003. In the late 1970s the Soviet Union had built an SST of its own, the Tupolev Tu-144 (dubbed the ï¿½Concordskiï¿½).

It briefly saw limited service between Moscow and Vladivostok and was promptly mothballed after it was involved in a disastrous crash at the 1973 Paris Air Show. Concorde The inroads made by the Airbus A340 in the wide-body passenger jet market have prompted Boeing to forge ahead again and develop the 777, reputed to be the first commercial passenger airplane created completely by computer and without paper. The 777 uses the most sophisticated electronic communications, navigation, and digital display, and provides a higher standard of passenger comfort (but is still impoverished compared to the airliners of the 1930s). The important issue in the 1990s in commercial aviation is the management crisis that plagues many airlines and the industry as a whole. Twenty years of labour difficulties, mismanagement, airport congestion, rising fuel costs, and government interference, as well as questions raised concerning safety and protection from aircraft failure, terrorism, and even on-board pollution, have put the commercial air transportation industry in an extreme state of crisis, causing financial analysts to wonder whether anyone can still make any money flying people from one place to another.

Airbus finally passed Boeing as the Worlds premier airliner manufacturer in the late 1990s and its 'SuperJumbo' A380 is shortly to go into service and will carry up to 555 passengers. Airbus A380 on test flights Your browser does not support inline frames or is currently configured not to display inline frames. Boeing 707 Boeing 707 The Boeing 707 prototype Model 367-80 or "Dash 80". The Boeing 707 was not the first US transport aircraft to be jet-powered; that distinction belonged to the experimental military XC-123A powered assault glider. However, the 707 was the first production American jet airliner that allowed the US to gain the lead in commercial jet transportation. The 707 remained in continuous production from the mid-1950s until 1977 with more than 1,000 aircraft produced. The 707 prototype, the Model 367-80 or "Dash 80", made its inaugural flight on July 15, 1954.

Its main competitor at the time was the British De Havilland Comet, but the 707 had accommodations for approximately four times as many passengers as the original Comet I that had first flown on July 27, 1949—it was also 100 mph faster than the Comet. This, combined with a series of accidents for the Comet, helped establish the 707 in World-Wide service. (One year after the Comet went into service, three aircraft broke up in flight due to metal fatigue. Cracks originating from the window corners caused catastrophic failures.) The Comet 4 was first to open a transatlantic passenger jet service, on October 4, 1958, but this was followed by a Pan American 707 on October 26, 1958 and went on to inaugurate the first round the world jet passenger service on October 10, 1959. Initial orders from the airlines were delayed because they were still flying fairly new piston-powered aircraft that they still needed to recoup their investment from, so the first 29 aircraft were built as KC-13A fuel tankers.

It wasn�t long before the airlines started ordering jets and then a flood of orders came from airlines all over the world, after a large order was placed by Pan American. Production centered on two major series, the 707-120 medium-range versions for up to 181 passengers and the 707-320 long-range versions for 189 passengers. When production ended in 1977, a total of 1,011 Boeing 707 airliners were produced and were operating in every continent of the world. The story of the 707 begins with Boeing trying to develop an improved version of the Model 367 that the Air Force was currently using as the C-97. It was then realized that the performance of the C-97 with existing piston engines and the B-29 wing had reached its limits and that a whole new aerodynamic design was needed. Boeing was looking to develop a commercial variant of the B-47 , but continued to work through the Model 367 or C-97 development line.

The final form was the 80th configuration of the Model 367 and so designated as the Model 367-80. Boeing kept this designation as to not tip off its competitors. Word had a way of getting around in the industry and the 367-80 designation would give the allusion that it was just a further development of the C-97. It wasn�t until the aircraft was unveiled that Boeing designated it as the Model 707. The fuselage of the 707 had the same width as the C-97, but the sides were smoothed out and did not have the pronounced crease. The length of the tubular fuselage remained straight so that sections could be added for increased capacity. The wings and engine pylons were variants of the B-47 and B-52 but were more rigid with pronounced dihedral built in. Panels could be added at the wing roots to increase wing span. A distinctive feature of the 707 was the High Frequency (HF) boom antenna pointing forward at the top of the vertical stabilizer. The horizontal stabilizer also had a pronounced dihedral.

There were two sets of ailerons, inboard and outboard. With the flaps down, both sets of ailerons would operate. With the flaps retracted, only the inboard ailerons would be operated during cruise to dampen lateral control. Spoilers would also function for lateral control and as speed brakes. The flaps were located between the engines so as to not obstruct the jet exhaust. When commercial jets were first introduced, noise was a great problem and some jet airliners were barred from certain airports such as New York�s LaGuardia Airport. Stopping a heavy propellerless airplane was another consideration. Boeing spent $15 million to develop both engine noise suppressors and thrust reverser systems as a solution.1 An early Boeing 707 with JT4 engines, equipped with sound suppressors. The HF antenna on top of the vertical stabilizer was a distinctive feature of the 707. The original Boeing 707 was followed by a series of 707 passenger and cargo variants, with different lengths, weights and engines.

The passenger carrying 707-320B and passenger/cargo 707-320C models were still in production in 1977. Also developed was the short-to-medium-range version known as the Boeing 720 or the 720B with JT3D turbofans . By the end of October 1976, they had flown more than 30 million hours and carried just under 522 million passengers. In 1970 it was still not unusual for passengers to disembark on the airport ramp. Boeing 707 Model 120 Jet Transport The first production airplane of the Boeing 707 commercial jet series made its maiden flight December 20, 1957, with Pan American World Airways putting the airplane into transoceanic service October 26, 1958, and American Airlines following with transcontinental service January 25, 1959.

The prototype jet airliner, built as a private venture by Boeing at a cost of more than $16,000,000, amassed more than 1000 hours in its four years of flight testing, while the first three of the production airplanes used for Civil Aeronautics Administration certification testing raised the overall total to more than 1650 hours. In addition, the new jet transports benefited by the thousands of hours of flight time logged by their military counterpart, the Boeing KC-135 jet multipurpose tanker-transports which went into service in 1957. Including the prototype, there are eight Boeing jet airliners; the others are the 707-120, the 707-120B, the 707-220, the 707-320, the 707-420, the 720 and the 720B. Weighing in at 248,000 pounds as compared with the prototype's 190,000, the 120 is principally intended for continental use.

The 220 is identical in airframe and body size to the 120, but is powered by Pratt & Whitney JT4 turbojet engines, larger and of greater thrust than the JT3. The "B" airplanes use Pratt & Whitney JT3D turbofan engines. SPECIFICATIONS (120): Span 130 ft. 10 in.; Height 42 ft.; Length 144 ft. 6 in.; Engines Four Pratt & Whitney JT3C-6 turbojet, more than 10,000 lb. thrust; Gear tricycle, main undercarriage units, four-wheel trucks, dual nose wheels. PERFORMANCE: Cruise Speed 591 mph; Cruising Altitude 25,000 to 40,000 ft. Boeing 707 Intercontinental Jet Transport The 320 and the 420 are the Intercontinental 707s, which partially fulfill the growth potential Boeing designed into the basic 707 series.

Weighing more than 295,000 pounds, they are 8 feet, 5 inches longer overall than the 120, 220, and 720, have 11 feet 7 inches more wingspan, and 500 square feet of additional wing area. Fuselage diameter, 148 inches, is the same in all models. Only difference between the 320 and 420 is the engines, the former using Pratt & Whitney JT4s and the latter Rolls-Royce "Conways." SPECIFICATIONS INTERCONTINENTAL: Span 142 ft. 5 in.; Height 42 ft.; Length 152 ft. 11 in.; Engines Four Pratt & Whitney JT4 or Rolls Royce Conway turbojets, more than 10,000 Lb, thrust; Gear tricycle, main undercarriage units, four-wheel trucks, dual nose wheels. PERFORMANCE: Cruise Speed 591 mph; Cruising Altitude 25,000 to 40,000 ft.

Boeing 720 Jet Transport Designed to operate profitably in the medium range area, the Boeing 720 combines low cost with excellent operational flexibility. Associated with its capability to operate over existing route segments is the ability of the 720 to utilize present runways and terminal facilities throughout the entire airline system. The 720 offers a high level of safety, ease of maintenance and inspection, long life, minimum structural weight and reliability based on experience and extensive test programs. The seats are mounted on continuous tracks recessed in the floor, allowing use of four, five and six-abreast seating. In less than ten minutes each row of seats and its accompanying overhead service unit can be repositioned or replaced. Windows are spaced at 20-inch intervals to insure an unobstructed view regardless of seat spacing. This flexibility permits a choice of seating combinations ranging from the luxurious four-abreast interior to the six-abreast, 149-passenger tourist arrangement. SPECIFICATIONS: Span 130 ft. 10 in; Length 136ft. 2 in.; Height 41 ft.

6.5 in.; Empty Weight 103,145 Lb.; Engines Four Pratt & Whitney JT3C-7; Fuel Capacity 11,500 gal.; Wing Area 2433 sq. ft. PERFORMANCE: Maximum Speed more than 600 mph; Maximum Range 3300 mi.; Cruising Altitude 15,000 to 40,000 ft. Endnotes:

Question: What was the world's first jet-driven airliner to enter commercial service?
Answer: The Comet