aeronautics

The First Non-stop Westbound Flight over the North Atlantic

13. April 2022 Tabea Tietz

On April 13, 1928, German pilots Hermann Köhl and Ehrenfried Günther Freiherr von Hünefeld together with their Irish co-pilot James Fitzmaurice succeeded in crossing the Atlantic from east to west in an airplane. 36 hours after their take off in Baldonnel, Ireland, they landed with their Junkers W33 aircraft called ‘Bremen‘ on the Canadian island Greenly Island. Transatlantic Flights The possibility of transatlantic flight by aircraft emerged after the First World War, which had…

aviation

James Sadler – the First English Aeronaut

27. February 2022 Tabea Tietz

On February 27, 1753, English chemist, pastry chef, and aviation pioneer James Sadler was born. He is best known for being the first English aeronaut, whose first successful ascent was on 4 Oct 1784, in a hot-air balloon, from Christ Church Meadow, Oxford. England’s first Balloonists Sadler worked as a pastry chef in the family business, The Lemon Hall Refreshment House, a small shop in Oxford. He was the second known person in…

aviation

Reaching the Edge of Outer Space – the X-15 Rocket Space Plane

3. October 2021 Tabea Tietz

On October 3, 1967, the X-15 rocket plane achieved a world record speed of Mach 6.7, which is 7,274 km/h (4,520 mph or over a mile per second) with U.S. Air Force pilot Pete Knight. As by today, this record still holds for the highest speed ever reached by a manned, powered aircraft. Among the notable pilots of the X-15 was also Neil Armstrong,[4] later a NASA astronaut and first man to set…

art

Nicolas-Jacques Conté and the Creation of the Pencil

4. August 2020 Harald Sack

On August 4, 1755, French painter, inventor, army officer and balloonist, Nicolas-Jacques Conté was born. Among others, he is credited with the invention of the modern pencil. Moreover, some consider him one of the greatest inventive minds of the eighteenth century. He distinguished himself for his mechanical genius which was of great avail to the French army in Egypt. Napoleon Bonaparte called him “a universal man with taste, understanding and genius capable of…

aviation

The Wright Brothers Invented the Aviation Age

17. December 2018 Harald Sack

On December 17, 1903, the brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright wrote history with the first flight of their Flyer One, the very first successful powered aircraft in the sands south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, U.S. “Isn’t it astonishing that all these secrets have been preserved for so many years just so we could discover them!” – Orville Wright Prior Attempts Although the Brothers Montgolfier had ascended in their first hot air balloon…

aviation

Aviatrix Wilhelmine Reichard

16. April 2018 Harald Sack

On April 16, 1811, Wilhelmine Reichard launched to her first solo flight in a gas balloon, thus becoming Germany`s very first female balloonist. You might remember that in 1783 the brothers Montgolfier already launched the very first balloon, as we reported in our recent blog post ‘More than just Hot Air…‘. [3] Actually, the first passengers were a sheep, a rooster, and a duck that were given the honor to take part…

aviation

Hugh L. Dryden and High Speed Aerodynamics

2. July 2017 Harald Sack

On July 2, 1898, physicist and deputy administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Hugh Latimer Dryden was born. Dryden made pioneering studies in the aerodynamics of high speed and some of the earliest studies of air flow around wing surfaces at the speed of sound. “I believe as a matter of faith that the extension of space travel to the limits of the solar system will probably be accomplished in several…