Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/December 21

December 21

• 2012 – The Republic of South Sudan's Sudan People's Liberation Army shoots down a United Nations helicopter on a reconnaissance flight over Jonglei in South Sudan, killing its entire four-man Russian crew. South Sudan at first denies shooting the helicopter down, then expresses regret for the incident, saying its forces had shot the helicopter down after mistaking it for a plane from Sudan flying supplies in to rebels in Jonglei.

• 2009 – Spanish airline Air Comet ceases operations.

• 2007 – First flight of the OMA SUD Skycar

• 1999 – Cubana de Aviación Flight 1216, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10, overruns the runway at La Aurora International Airport, killing 16 of 314 people on board and another two on the ground.

• 1994 – Air Algérie/Phoenix Flight 702P, ship name Oasis, registration 7 T-VEE, was a Boeing 737 owned by Air Algérie and leased by Phoenix Aviation which crashed near Coventry Airport, England. All five on board were killed.

• 1993 – First flight of the Cessna Citation X

• 1992 – Martinair Flight 495 crashes in Faro, Portugal, killing 54 people and injuring 106.

• 1990 – Kelly Johnson (engineer) dies, aged 80.

• 1988 – Pan Am Flight 103, a Boeing 747, disintegrates in the air over Lockerbie, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland after a terrorist bomb explodes on board. All 259 people on board and 11 on the ground are killed. The incident is also known as the Lockerbie air disaster.

• 1988 – First flight of the Antonov An-225 Mriya

• 1982 – The last V-bomber squadron of Britain's RAF, 44, is disbanded at Waddington, Lincolnshire.

• 1979 – The NASA NASA AD-1 oblique-wing concept demonstrator makes its first flight at Edwards Air Force Base.

• 1978 – Seventeen-year-old Robin Oswald hijacks Trans World Airlines Flight 541, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9 with 87 people on board, threatening to blow up the airliner if her father is not released from prison. The aircraft makes an emergency landing at Williamson County Regional Airport in Marion, Illinois, where authorities talk her into surrendering without further incident. Her father, Garrett B. Trapnell, had been imprisoned for a 1972 airliner hijacking and her mother, Barbara Ann Oswald, Trapnell's wife, had been killed when she hijacked a helicopter in May 1978 in order to help him escape from prison.

• 1976 – Imperial Iranian Air Force Lockheed C-130H Hercules c/n 4463, delivered as 5-148, September 1972, renumbered 5-142, November 1973, renumbered 5-8536, 1976, crashed during approach in bad weather to Shiraz, Iran.

• 1970 – First flight of the Grumman F-14 Tomcat

• 1968 – Apollo 8, the first manned mission to the moon, is launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. At 2 h:50 m:37 s Mission elapsed time (MES), the crew performs the first ever manned Trans Lunar Injection and become the first humans to leave Earth's gravity.

• 1966 – First flight of the Martin X-23 PRIME

• 1965 – New York Airways commences helicopter services between the roof of the Pan Am building and John F. Kennedy International Airport

• 1964 – First flight of the General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark at Carswell Air Force Base, Texas. This was the world's first major combat aircraft with variable geometry wings.

• 1959 – Two prototypes of the Tupolev Tu-105 (Samolët 105) were built with the first flying on 21 June: 1958. The second modified prototype was designated the Tu-105A (Samolët 105A), first flown 7 September 1959. On its seventh test flight, this date, Samolët 105A was lost, the radio operator successfully ejecting, the pilot Yuri Alasheev and the navigator being killed. The 105A was accepted for production as the Tupolev Tu-22B.

• 1957 – The first aircraft carrier designed as such to be launched in France, Clemenceau, is launched by the Brest Arsenal at Brest.

• 1951 – English Electric Canberra B2, USAF 51-17387, ex-RAF WD932, used as pattern aircraft for Martin B-57 Canberra, crashes during flight from Martin plant at Middle River, Maryland, north of Baltimore. It lost a wing during a 4.8g manoeuvre at 10,000 feet (3,000 m) over Centerville, Maryland, on the Delmarva Peninsula due to incorrect fuel handling that led to tail heaviness which caused loss of control during the high g manoeuvring. Both crew members ejected, but one of them was killed when his parachute failed to open.

• 1945 - Ethiopian Airlines is founded.

• 1943 – Rabaul-based Japanese aircraft make three dive-bombing attacks on U. S. forces unloading at Arawe.

• 1943 – (21-30) Butaritari-based U. S. Army Air Forces Douglas A-24 Banshee dive bombers make nine strikes on Mili Atoll and one on Jaluit.

• 1941 – RAF No. 4 Operational Training Unit (OTU) loses third Saro Lerwick flying boat, L7265, when Flg. Off. Armstrong hits water hard near Invergordon whilst practising landings, wing distortion leads to total loss of control, all crew escape.

• 1941 – Curtiss XSB2C-1 Helldiver, BuNo 1758, destroyed after suffering inflight wing failure. Pilot Baron T. Hulse bails out. Airframe had previously crashed on 8 February 1941 due to engine failure during approach. Sustained damage to fuselage but was repaired.

• 1941 – (21-22) Aircraft from the Japanese carriers Hiryū and Sōryū strike Wake Island, which will fall to the Japanese on December 23.

• 1941 – The German submarine U-751 torpedoes and sinks the British escort carrier HMS Audacity while she is escorting a convoy about 430 nautical miles (800 km) west of Cape Finisterre. During her three months of operations, Audacity’s aircraft have shot down five Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Condor aircraft, damaged three more, and driven one off, contributed to the sinking of a German submarine, and greatly interfered with the operations of German submarines against convoys she had escorted, proving the value of escort carrier escort of convoys. As a result, the Allies will begin to commit escort carriers to convoy escort operations in the Atlantic Ocean again in 1943.

• 1941 – The Luftwaffe’s Fliegerkorps II begins a steadily escalating bombing and sea mining campaign against Malta with a goal of knocking out British air and naval forces based there.

• 1940 – Nine Fairey Swordfish from the British aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious sink two Italian merchant ships off Tunisia with the loss of one Swordfish.

• 1936 – First flight of the Junkers Ju 88 V1 prototype D-AQEN

• 1936 – Eddie August Schneider, Bert Acosta, and Frederic Ives Lord, as the Yankee Squadron, travel by ship to fight in the Spanish Civil War with the Loyalists.

• 1923 – The French Navy airship Dixmude, formerly the German LZ114, is lost over the Mediterranean in a storm in early morning with the loss of all 44 of her crew.

• 1914 – The UK is bombed by a German aircraft for the first time – A Taube drops two bombs near the Admiralty Pier, Kent.

• 1914 – Flying a Maurice Farman biplane, Royal Naval Air Service Wing Commander Charles R. Samson conducts history’s first night bombing raid, attacking Ostend, Belgium.

• 1910 – Hélène Dutrieu becomes the first winner of the Coupe Femina (Femina Cup) for a non-stop flight of 167 km (104 mi) in 2 hours 35 min.
• 1896 - The company "Mallet, Mélandri et de Pitray" was founded by Maurice Mallet, Henry de la Vaulx and their associates. Specializing in hot air balloons then in airships and aircraft, this company later became Zodiac (renamed Zodiac Aerospace in 2008).