On This Day in Aviation History

On This Day in Aviation History

1896 – Birth of Edward Duncan Crundall, British World War I flying ace, World War II pilot; he also would become a commercial pilot and author.

1909 – First powered airplane flight over Australia is made by British racing driver and pilot Colin Defries with a Wright Model A.

1936 – Death of Juan de la Cierva y Codorníu, a Spanish civil engineer, pilot and aeronautical engineer, who invented a single-rotor type of aircraft that came to be called autogyro.

1959 – A Kaman H43B “Huskie” rescue helicopter sets a new helicopter altitude record of 29,846 feet flown by U.S. Air Force pilots William J. Davis and Walter J. Hodgson.

1988 – First flight of the Saab JAS 39 Gripen (shown), a Swedish multirole jet fighter fitted with a delta wing and canard configuration.

2012 – Ten minutes after takeoff, during a domestic flight in Mexico from Monterrey to Toluca, a Learjet 25 carrying Mexican-American singer and reality television star Jenni Rivera and six other people, loses contact with air traffic controllers, enters a rapid descent and crashes; all aboard die.

Updated: December 9, 2013 — 10:35 AM
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