Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/May 20

May 20

• 2013 – Passenger-carrying flights of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner resume in the United States as United Airlines Flight 1 flies from Houston, Texas, to Chicago, Illinois. United, which plans to resume international 787 service on 10 June, becomes the fourth airline to resume Dreamliner flights, after Ethiopian Airlines, Qatar Airways, and Air India.

• 2009 – The 2009 Indonesia C-130H Hercules crash was an aircraft accident in Indonesia on May 20, 2009. The Indonesian Air Force Lockheed C-130 Hercules airplane was carrying 112 people (98 passengers and 14 crew) and crashed at about 6:30 local time (23:30 UTC), while flying from Jakarta to eastern Java. The crash resulted in at least 98 deaths, 5 of which occurred on impact when the plane ploughed through a neighborhood, striking at least four houses before skidding into a paddy, in the village of Geplak. Two people on the ground were killed. At least 70 others had been taken to a local hospital. Authorities believe that there is still 1 missing body.

• 2003 – First flight of the SpaceShipOne (first captive flight, unmanned)

• 1982 – A Dassault Mirage III of the Brazilian Air Force crashed, two crew killed.

• 1978 – McDonnell Douglas delivers its 5,000th F-4 Phantom II aircraft, twenty years after the first flight of the prototype.

• 1977 – Introduction: Embraer EMB 121 Xingu

• 1977 – First flight of the Sukhoi T-10 (prototype of Sukhoi Su-27)

• 1973 – First flight of the PZL M-15 Belphegor

• 1971 – Boeing announces that it has canceled its Supersonic Transport (SST) project.

• 1967 – American aircraft strike military targets in downtown Hanoi.

• 1965 – Pakistan International Airlines Flight 705, a Boeing 720-040 B on an inaugural flight carrying mostly journalists and owners of travel agencies and crewed by what the airline considered its best crew members, crashes short of the runway while descending to land at Cairo International Airport in Cairo, Egypt, killing 119 of the 125 people on board and injuring all six survivors.

• 1965 – DHC-6 Twin Otter prototype was test flown at Downsview by R. H. Fowler.

• 1959 – First flight of the Aérospatiale N 262 (MH.250)

• 1959 – A USAF Lockheed C-130A Hercules 57-0468, c/n 3175 overshot the runway at Ashiya AB, Japan . The pilot tried to pull up, but the C-130 crashed into Air Force barracks. 9 fatalities.

• 1958 – Vickers Viscount N7410 of Capital Airlines collides in mid-air with a Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star of the Air National Guard. All eleven on board the Viscount are killed when it crashes at Brunswick, Maryland, as is one of the two crew members of the T-33.

• 1958 – A United States Air Force Lockheed T-33A-5-LO Shooting Star, 53-5966, operated by the Maryland Air National Guard collided in mid-air with a Capital Airlines Vickers Viscount, registered N7410 operating flight Capital 300 at 8,000 ft (2,400 m) four miles (6 km) east of Brunswick, Maryland. All 11 on board the Viscount were killed and the T-33 co-pilot, the T-33 pilot ejected and survived.

• 1951 – U. S. Air Force Captain James Jabara becomes the first fighter ace to score his five victories in a jet (an F-86 Sabre) against jets (Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 s).

• 1949 – A USAF Fairchild C-82A Packet, 48-572, c/n 10207, of the 1227th Air Base Group, Goose Bay, Labrador, veers off runway during takeoff at primitive Arctic Isachsen airstrip, Isachsen weather station, Ellef Ringnes Island, Northwest Territory, Canada, at 1745 hrs. Zulu. Despite crew attempts to keep the aircraft from drifting to the left, the port landing gear catches a snow bank, increasing veer, then port propeller strikes snow pack at 90 mph and 2800 rpm, ripping engine from mount and making aircraft uncontrollable. Three crew uninjured but aircraft written off, abandoned on site. Hull used for a shelter for a time. Wreckage still on site. The C-82 had delivered an engine and parts to repair a stranded Douglas C-54D-5-DC Skymaster, 42-72614, with a failed number 2 engine. The position of the Skymaster had required a downwind takeoff run.

• 1946 – Grumman J4F-2 Widgeon amphibian out of NAS Brunswick, Maine, makes forced landing on Sebago Lake due to engine trouble and suffers moderate damage. Crew uninjured.

• 1946 – In an accident very similar to the B-25 Mitchell that struck the Empire State Building in 1945, a USAAF Beech C-45F Expeditor, 44-47570, of the 4108th AAF Base Unit, Air Material Command, piloted by Manuel R. Campbell, on a navigation training flight from Lake Charles Army Air Field, Louisiana,[97] crashes in fog at ~2010 hrs. into the 58th floor of the Bank of Manhattan Trust Building at 40 Wall Street, Manhattan, New York City, whilst attempting to land at Newark Army Airfield, New Jersey. Four crew KWF, no injuries on the ground.

• 1945 – 29 aircraft from the British aircraft carriers HMS Ameer, HMS Khedive, and HMS Stalker conduct devastating strikes against Japanese shipping, airfields, and communications in southern Burma and Sumatra.

• 1944 – American aircraft raid Marcus Island.

• 1941 – Italian CANT Z.1007 high-level bombers sink the British destroyer HMS Juno southeast of Crete.

• 1941 – Germany invades Crete in Operation Merkur (“Mercury”), the Luftwaffe’s first large airborne assault and the first mainly airborne invasion in military history, dropping 10,000 paratroopers and 750 glider troops onto the island; 610 bombers, dive bombers, and fighters, 500 transport aircraft, and 80 gliders support the operation. The Germans encounter such unexpectedly heavy opposition by British and Commonwealth troops on the island that they fear the operation will fail.

• 1937 – Entered Service: Fairey Battle with No. 63 Squadron, Royal Air Force

• 1937 – First flight of the de Havilland Albatross.

• 1932 – Amelia Earhart, flying a Lockheed Vega, becomes the first woman to make a solo flight across the North Atlantic, flying from Harbour Grace in Newfoundland to Derry in Northern Ireland in 14 hours 54 min.

• 1929 – The Peruvian Army’s aviation branch and the Peruvian Navy’s Naval Aviation Corps are combined to form the Peruvian Aviation Corps, forerunner of the Peruvian Air Force.

• 1929 – Charles Lindbergh marries Anne, daughter of Dwight W. Morrow, U. S. Ambassador to Mexico and author of an influential report on American aviation on 27 May 1929.

• 1927 – (20-21) Charles Lindbergh flies across the Atlantic nonstop from New York City to Paris. It is the first solo transatlantic flight. In his Ryan monoplane Spirit of St. Louis, he covers 3,600 miles in 33 hours, 29 min and wins the Orteig Prize of $25,000.

• 1927 – Flight Lieutenant Roderic Carr sets out to set a new distance record, attempting to fly from England to India in a Hawker Horsely. Three days later, he will be rescued from the Persian Gulf.

• 1924 – French Captain Georges Pelletier d'Oisy and Adjutant Lucien Besin crash their Breguet 19.A.2 on a golf course in Shanghai, ending their attempt to fly around the world eastbound. They had covered 10,580 miles (17,037 km) in 26 days since leaving Paris.

• 1918 – German bombs fall on London for the last time in World War I. During their one-year-long heavier-than-air bombing campaign against England, the Germans have dropped 84,745 kg (186,830 lbs) of bombs and lost 61 bombers.

• 1917 – A Royal Naval Air Service Curtiss H-12 Large America flying boat bombs and sinks the German submarine U-36 in the North Sea near the North Hinder light ship while flying a “Spider Web” patrol. U-36 becomes the only German submarine sunk by an aircraft during World War I.

• 1784 – The first women to ascend in a tethered balloon are the Marchioness de Montalembert, the Contess de Montalenbert, the Contess de Podenas, and Mademoiselle de Ligarde. Their Montgolfier balloon lifts to the length of the restraining rope.