2012 – EasySky Flight 735, While attempting to land at San Pedro Sula Airport, the aircraft veered off the runway and ran into a ditch about 130 feet off the runway before coming to a stop. There were no serious injuries among the crew of 2 and 17 passengers. The captain received minor injuries. The crew reported a problem with the brakes during roll out just before the aircraft veered off the runway.[1]
2012 – The Kachin Independence Army again claims to be under attack by Myanmar Air Force aircraft.[2]
2012 – Aleppo International Airport is closed due to fighting between Syrian government and rebel forces around the base of the Syrian Army force protecting the airport.[3]
1999 – Fear of the Y2 Kcomputer bug and possible in-flight consequences for those planes flying during the night of December 31, 1999 and the early morning of January 1, 2000, spreads around the airline industry.
1956 – A United States Air Force Lockheed C-121C, 54-165, crashed on approach to Dhahran, Saudi Arabia while flying UN troops into the Suez Canal zone. It was also carrying Hungarian refugees back to Charleston AFB, South Carolina. 12 of 38 onboard killed.[citation needed]
1951 – The year-end tally showed that for the first time, total passenger flying miles exceeded that of railroad miles at 10.6 million.
1944 – University Air Training Squadrons were disbanded.
1943 – Japanese Rabaul-based aircraft raid U. S. forces off Arawe, losing four aircraft.
1943 – Since mid-December, when they began staging through Tarawa Atoll, U. S. Army Air Forces B-24 Liberators have dropped 601 tons (545,227 kg) of bombs on the Marshall Islands.
1943 – Kawanishi N1K2-J Shiden Kai (“Violet Lightning Modified”), Allied reporting name “George”
1942 – (Overnight) Guided by an Oboe-equipped Mosquito, eight Pathfinder Force Avro Lancasters bomb on sky markers suspended by parachute for the first time in a raid on Düsseldorf. Bomber Command previously had employed only ground markers, and the new capability allows British bombers to bomb through ten-tenths cloud cover.
1942 – During 1942, the U. S. Army Air Forces' Eleventh Air Force has destroyed at least 50 Japanese aircraft in the Aleutian Islands campaign in exchange for the loss of 12 aircraft in combat and almost 80 to other causes. Japanese non-combat aircraft losses in the Aleutian Islands have been equally high. Since October 1, Eleventh Air Force aircraft have dropped 500,000 pounds (230,000 kg) of bombs on Japanese bases in the Aleutians.
1940 – A Vickers Wellington IA bomber, N2980, R for Robert, of No. 20 OTU, out of RAF Lossiemouth, suffers starboard engine failure at 8,000 feet in a snow storm whilst on a training flight over Great Glen, Scotland. Pilot, Squadron Leader Marlwood-Elton orders crew of six trainee navigators and the tail gunner to bail-out, all escaping safely save the gunner whose chute fails to open. Marlwood-Elton and P/O Slatter (also reported as Slater) then notice a body of water and they successfully ditch in the northern basin of Loch Ness near the A82 road, both escaping before the airframe sinks. Discovered by side-scan sonar in 1976, the rare Wellington is raised on 21 September 1985, and restored at Weybridge where she was built. Now on display at the Brooklands Museum, it is one of only two known intact Wellingtons.
