1867 – Roberto Adolfo Chodasiewicz, a Polish-born Argentinian military engineer, demonstrate the operation of balloons with James Allen on the first aerostatic flight in South America.
1916 – Death of Victor S. Chapman, a French-American World War I pilot, dies in his Nieuport 16; he is the first U.S. airman to be killed in action.
1943 – The RAF uses chaff, codenamed “Window,” for the first time to foil German radar during the Operation Gomorrah raids on Hamburg.
1946 – Birth of Ellison Shoji Onizuka, Japanese-American astronaut and U.S. Air Force test pilot; he become the first Asian American to reach space.
1980 – First flight of the Microturbo Microjet 200, a French two-seat, lightweight jet trainer.
1982 – British Airways Flight 9, a Boeing 747-200, flies through a cloud of volcanic ash south of Java; all engines fail in flight, forcing the plane to glide; the crew is able to restart the engines and make a safe landing.
