Milestones of Flight: 11/8

2007 - Two seasoned pilots, both senior officers in the Civil Air Patrol, flew into a mountain near Las Vegas this evening.

Col. Edwin Lewis, director of operations for CAP’s western region, and Col. Dion DeCamp, commander of the Nevada unit, died when their CAP Cessna 182 hit 8,500-ft. Mt. Polosi, about 12 miles southwest of Las Vegas. They were flying to Lewis’s California home after delivering a display aircraft to Aviation Nation, an air show at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas.

Lewis retired from Pan Am in 1989 and was a NASA test pilot at Edwards Air Force Base. DeCamp retired from American Airlines in 1994 and was a key organizer of the search for Steve Fossett.

2007 - A U.S. Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter crashed in an uninhabited area about 25 miles southwest of Aviano in northern Italy today, killing at least four people on board and injuring six.

Killed in the crash were Capt. Cartize B. Durham, Staff Sgt. Robert D. Rogers, Staff Sgt. Mark A. Spence and Senior Airman Kenneth P. Hauprich Jr. of the Air Force; and Capt. Christian P. Skoglund and Chief Warrant Officer 2 Davidangelo F. Alvarez of the Army.

The accident sequence began as the helicopter flew over the Piave River training area, about 22 miles south of Aviano. The aircraft "began a slow, nose low, left-pedal turn. Upon initiation of the turn, the aircraft began a diving spin to the left from which the crew could not recover." The aircraft subsequently crashed into the Piave riverbed. The cause of the loss of yaw control could not be determined in the investigation; however, there was no evidence of pilot error or environmental factors contributing to the crash.

2007 - Space Shuttle Discovery STS-120 landed in Cape Canaveral, Florida this evening at 19:01 CET (18:01 UT), completing one of the most complex assembly missions to the International Space Station to date, bringing back seven crew members, including ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli.



2007 - Boeing has named Darryl Davis to the position of president, Advanced Systems, for Boeing Integrated Defense Systems (IDS).

Davis replaces George Muellner, who recently announced his intent to retire, effective December 31, 2007.

2006 - U.S. SecDef Rumsfeld Resigns. Former CIA chief Robert Gates has been nominated as his replacement.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has earned a place in history for his ambitious effort to transform the defense department into a robust organization during two major ground wars.

Whatever you think of Donald Rumsfeld as one of the architects of the war in Iraq, whatever you think of his policies and his advocacy regarding Iraq, he deserves credit as a bureaucratic reformer.

2005 - Canada and the U.S. signed an agreement that liberalized air services between the two countries. The so-
called Open Skies agreement.

2005 - Korean Air began flying faster polar routes to U.S.

The new route passes north of the 78th parallel, shaving over 300 miles off the standard route which passes over the Kamchatka peninsula. In the case of the New York-Incheon sector, which now passes over Anchorage, Alaska and the Kamchatka, the polar route now takes 30 minutes off the previous 14-hour trip.

2005 - Continental Airlines becomes the first carrier to inaugurate scheduled nonstop daily flights from the US to India.

2005 - The University of North Dakota (UND), NASA and Air Force join to land national suborbital research center and its Flying Lab.

2002 - Debris from a space satellite that fell from its orbit struck a six-year-old boy in Shaanxi Province, China.

2001 - U.S. jets struck Taliban targets across northern Afghanistan and fierce fighting was reported around the Taliban-held city of Mazar-e-Sharif.



2000 - Canada and the U.S. signed an agreement that liberalized air services between the two countries. The so-called Open Skies agreement.

1999 - Cosmonaut, Air Force Group 4--1967, Yuri Vassilyevich Malyshev dies at age of 58.


1998 - Four U.S. Navy fliers were lost at sea and presumed dead after their EA-6B Prowler struck an S-3 Viking aircraft on the carrier Enterprise during nighttime landing practice off of Virginia. Two crewmen landed safely on the deck.

1995 - An air force Fokker 27 crashed in central Argentina’s mountains and killed all 57 on board.

1984 - NASA Astronaut Anna Lee Tingle Fisher, M. D., M.D. became the first mother to fly in space aboard Space Shuttle Discovery STS-51-A .

1971 - The jet-powered S-3A, Navy's newest antisubmarine warfare aircraft, made its official roll-out at Lockheed-California Company's Burbank facility. Christened the Viking, the aircraft was designed to replace the aging S-2 Tracker.

1956 - Navy plastic Stratolab balloon (Lt. Cmdr. Malcolm D. Ross and 2Lt. Cmdr. M. Lee Lewis), on flight to gather meteorological, cosmic ray, and other scientific data, better world height record soaring to 76,000 feet , taking off near Rapid City, S. Dakota, and landing 175 miles away near Kennedy, Nebraska, thus breaking the record of 72,394 feet set in 1935 by O. A. Anderson and A. W. Stevens.

1952 - Charles Edward Chuck Jones, American astronaut, DoD Group 2--1982, is born in Clinton, Indiana, U.S.A.

Killed in 9-11 hijacking. He was aboard American Airlines Flight 11 as it crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center.

1950 - In what was thought to be history's first battle between jet aircraft, a U.S. Air Force Lockheed F-80 Shooting Star, piloted by Lt. Russell J. Brown, of the 16th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron, downs a North Korean MiG-15.

Lt. Col. Evans G. Stephens, the commander of the 16th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron (FIS), was leading three other F-80s on a strafing run on antiaircraft positions. As the Shooting Stars climbed back to 18,000 feet, the Americans noticed eight MiGs across the river at about their altitude. Oddly, the enemy pilots appeared to be showing off, doing loops and barrel rolls.

The MiGs suddenly broke off their aerial show to dive into the F-80 formation. Stephens's wingman, 1st Lt. Russell J. Brown, on detached service from the 26th FIS, got on the tail of a MiG as it swept past him. The MiG banked to the left, and Brown was able to cut the corner and catch the fast-moving fighter. Brown fired four short bursts, followed by four more. A plume of smoke gushed from the right side of the MiG-15's fuselage. Brown then fired a long burst, and the enemy plane exploded. The second¹ all-jet air-to-air combat in history had ended in a victory for Brown and the USAF.

1948 - Dale Allan Gardner, American astronaut, NASA Group 8--1978, is born in Fairmont, Minnesota, U.S.A.

1947 - Dr. Margaret Rhea Seddon, M.D., American astronaut, NASA Group 8--1978, is born in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, U.S.A.

1947 - Production of the La-15 starts at the Saratov aviation plant.

The Lavochkin La-15 was developed from the La-174D prototype which first flew in 1948 for a high speed lightweight fighter although eventually the MiG-15 would win out. The La-15 was a high-wing monoplane with elegant lines and swept wing configuration and able to attain speeds of just over 1000 km/h. It had better armament than the comparable F-86 Sabre but was also much lighter and in 1949 was revealed to bystanders at the Tushino Air Show. The La-15 had excellent manoeuvrability and was one of the first jet aircraft to feature a pressurised cockpit. For armament the La-15 employed three NR-23 cannons, and sometimes carried drop tanks for greater range. The type was in service til 1954.

1942 - Aleksandr Yakovlevich Kramarenko, Ukrainian cosmonaut, Air Force Group 3--1965, is born in Novaya Mayachka, Kerson, Ukraine.

1941 - Historic first black pilot training class began their Primary training at Tuskegee Army Air Field. There were a total of thirteen cadets.

Listed alphabetically they were: John C. Anderson, an all-American athlete from Toledo, University; Charles D. Brown, a college graduate from Abbeville, South Carolina; Theodore Brown from New York City with an MA from Northwestern University; Marion Carter, a college graduate from Chicago; Lemuel R. Custis from Hartford, Connecticut with a degree from Howard University; Captain Benjamin O. Davis, Jr., a West Point graduate; Charles DeBow from Indianapolis a graduate of Hampton Institute; Frederick H. Moore, a graduate of Tuskegee Institute from Sommerville, New Jersey; Ullysses S. Pannell from Regan, Texas with a degree in agriculture; George S. "Spanky" Roberts, a native of Fairmont, West Virginia and a graduate of West Virginia State; Mac Ross also a West Virginia State grad from Dayton, Ohio; William Slade, a college graduate from Raleigh, North Carolina, and Roderick Williams from Chicago a graduate from the University of Illinois.

1936 - Dr. Edward George Gibson, Ph.D., American astronaut, NASA Group 4--1965, is born in Buffalo, New York, U.S.A.

1932 - 1932 - Richard Earl Lawyer, American astronaut, USAF MOL Group 1--1965, is born Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.

1926 - Smolensk aircraft plant is founded.

In 1934, the Bureau of Special Designs (BOK) was transferred here, which specialized in the design of stratospheric and long-range aircraft. It built aircraft for most major designers. Starting in 1980, it worked on the wings and tail section of the Buran space shuttle and later built the whole shuttle airframe. Myasishchev-designed M-55 "Geofizika" construction was started here in 1984. It began production of the SP-98 sports aircraft designed by V.P. Kondrat'ev in 1997.

1904 - Norman de Bruyne is born Chile to a family of Dutch origin.

Norman de Bruyne helped to transform aircraft construction by developing strong new lightweight materials and synthetic glues. In 1928, he joined Lord Rutherford at his Cavendish Laboratory in atomic research. Subsequently developing an interest in flying, by 1934 he started his own company, Aero Research to research his invention of a new form of synthetic glue. The long-established casein glues used until then in the building of wooden aircraft were seriously affected in hot and humid conditions. His own revolutionary cantilever-wing "Snark" monoplane utilized his new bonding methods. Later, his metal-to-metal bonding of lightweight and very strong aluminium honeycomb aircraft structures were extensively used during WW II

1881 - Robert Estnault-Pelterie, early aviation pioneer is born. He invented ailerons (movable wing parts) and coined the word astronautics.

French engineer and aviation pioneer who made important contributions to the beginnings of heavier-than-air flight in Europe. He built a copy of the Wright brothers' glider of 1902, though he distrusted their steering technique. Consequently, he invented the aileron (a movable airfoil at the edge of the wing). He used a hand operated wheel to control them. Used symmetrically, they provided longitudinal stability. Used differentially, they controlled lateral stability. In 1907, he built one of the first monoplanes, REP-1, more noteworthy for its innovative 7-cylinder radial engine. It was the first plane with a completely enclosed fuselage. His longest flight in this aircraft was only 2,600 feet (600 m). He also invented a new type of fuel pump.
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¹ The first jet versus jet air battle in history took place on the first day of November 1950 when Lieutenant Khominich, 72nd GIAP, attacked F-80s from out of the sun. He shot down one before a sharp climb to gain altitude with a subsequent turn to the left leaving the combat.