Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/December

December 2

• 2012 – Syrian Air Force jets pound rebel-held suburbs around Damascus, killing and wounding dozens in an offensive to push rebels away from the Damascus International Airport and stop them from closing in on the capital.

• 2012 – Syria announces that Damascus International Airport has reopened and is running scheduled flights after being closed for three days due to fighting between government and rebel forces in the area.^[1]

• 2010 – US Navy F/A-18C Hornet, BuNo 165184, 'AD-351', suffers port undercarriage collapse on landing at NAF El Centro, California, at 1615 hrs., and departs runway. The pilot ejects safely.

• 2009 – Merpati Nusantara Airlines Fokker 100 PK-MJD makes an emergency landing at El Tari Airport, Kupang when the left main gear fails to extend. There are no injuries among the passengers and crew.

• 2004 – The pilot of a Blue Angels McDonnell-Douglas F/A-18, BuNo 161956, ejects approximately one mile off Perdido Key, Florida, after reporting mechanical problems and loss of power. Lt. Ted Steelman suffered minor injuries and fully recovered.

• 1996 – A U.S. Navy Beechcraft T-34C Turbo Mentor crashes at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama, killing the instructor and his student navigator from Italy. The pair, flying out of NAS Pensacola, Florida, were practicing maneuvers.

• 1993 – Launch: Space Shuttle Endeavour STS-61 at 10:53 am EDT. Mission highlights: Hubble Space Telescope servicing.

• 1992 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-53 at 13:24:00 UTC. Mission highlights: Partially classified 10th and final DoD mission. Likely deployment of SDS2 satellite.

• 1990 – Launch: Space Shuttle Columbia STS-35 at 1:49:01 am EST. Mission highlights: Use of ASTRO-1 observatory.

• 1988 – Launch: Space Shuttle Atlantis STS-27 at 09:30:34 EST. Mission highlights: Third classified DoD mission; Lacrosse 1 deployment.

• 1986 – Pacific Western Airlines merged with Canadian Pacific Airlines to form Canadian Airlines.

• 1986 – An Air France Concorde returns to Paris after an 18-day around the world trip with 94 passengers.

• 1977 – In the 1977 Benghazi Libyan Arab Airlines Tu-154 crash, a Tupolev Tu-154 leased from Balkan Bulgarian Airlines crashes near Benghazi, Libya due to fuel starvation, killing 59 of 165 on board.

• 1976 – The Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, an ex-American Airlines 747 which has been adapted to carry the US reusable space shuttle, makes its flight.

• 1968 – Wien Consolidated Airlines Flight 55, a Fairchild F-27B, crashes into Pedro Bay, Alaska. All 39 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 1965 – USS Enterprise becomes the first nuclear-powered warship to see combat, launching air strikes at the Viet Cong near Bien Hoa.

• 1964 – SAC Boeing B-47E-125-BW Stratojet, 53-2398, of the 380th Bomb Wing, suffers collapse of forward main gear unit, skids off right side of runway at Plattsburgh AFB, New York, crew escapes safely. Airframe struck off charge 13 January 1965.

• 1959 – A USAF Douglas VC-47D Skytrain, 43-49024, c/n 14840/26285, built as C-47B-10-DK, crashes and burns in woods 10 miles (16 km) N of Oslo, Norway, killing all four on board. There was fog in the area at the time of the accident.

• 1950 – (2–25) Four hundred aircraft from seven United Nations aircraft carriers support U. N. ground forces with air strikes while U. S. Air Force aircraft drop supplies to them as they break out of their encirclement in northern Korea and are evacuated successfully by sea from Hungnam in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir.

• 1948 – First flight of the Beechcraft T-34 Mentor

• 1945 – First flight of the Bristol 170

• 1945 – First flight of the Handley Page Hermes

• 1943 – First Canadian-built Mosquito aircraft saw action over Berlin with RAF 139 Squadron.

• 1943 – A night raid by 105 German Junkers Ju 88 bombers surprise the brilliantly lit Italian port of Bari while it is crowded with about 30 Allied ships, meeting little opposition. A sheet of flame from a burning tanker spreads over the harbor; 16 ships carrying 38,000 tons (34,473,374 kg) of cargo are destroyed, eight are damaged, and a quantity of mustard gas is released from the cargo of one stricken ship; at least 125 American personnel alone are killed; and the port does not return to full operations for three weeks. It is the most destructive single air raid against shipping since the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941.

• 1941 – Adolf Hitler orders the Luftwaffe’s Fliegerkorps II to redeploy from the Soviet Union to Sicily and North Africa and together with Fliegerkorps X to form Luftflotte 2 under the command of Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, and orders Kesselring to achieve air superiority over southern Italy and North Africa, suppress Allied forces on Malta, ensure safe passage of Axis convoys to North Africa, paralyze Allied sea traffic in the Mediterranean, and prevent Allied supplies from arriving at Tobruk and Malta. The redeployment will reverse the balance of power at sea in the Mediterranean in favor of the Axis.

• 1939 – New York’s La Guardia Airport opened for service!

• 1937 – First flight of the Brewster F2A Buffalo

• 1919 – First flight of the Handley Page Type W.

December 3

• 2012 – The Turkish Air Force scrambles fighters to protect Turkish airspace after a Syrian Air Force plane drops two bombs on rebel positions in Syria about 300 yards (274 meters) from the border with Turkey, killing at least 10 people and causing Syrian civilians to flee across the border to safety in Turkey.^[1]

• 2012 – Egyptair orders a Cairo, Egypt-to-Damascus, Syria, flight to turn back in mid-air because of concerns over the security situation around Damascus International Airport.^[2]

• 2010 – South East Airlines Flight 372, operated by Tupolev Tu-154 M RA-85744 crashed on landing at Domodedovo International Airport, Moscow, Russia. Of the 168 people on board, two passengers were killed. The aircraft was written off.

• 2006 – CH-46E Sea Knight from HMM-165 carrying 16 personnel made an emergency landing on Lake Qadisiyah in Al Anbar Province. Four of the passengers drowned in the incident.^[3][4]

• 2005 – XCOR Aerospace makes the first ever manned rocket aircraft delivery of US Mail in Mojave, California.

• 2004 – The 500th Boeing 777 is rolled out. The 777 will reach 500 airplanes delivered faster than any other twin-aisle airplane in history.

• 2003 – First flight of the Honda HA-420 HondaJet

• 1999 – NASA loses radio contact with the Mars Polar Lander moments before the spacecraft enters the Martian atmosphere.

• 1995 – Cameroon Airlines Flight 3701, a Boeing 737, loses control and crashes while on approach to Douala International Airport; of the 76 on board, 5 survive.

• 1990 – Northwest Airlines Flight 1482, a Douglas DC-9, collides with Northwest Airlines Flight 299, a Boeing 727, when the crew of the Douglas aircraft mistakenly taxis onto the active runway at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport. Seven passengers and one crew-member out of the 54 on board Flight 1482 perish; all on board Flight 299 survive.

• 1985 – Introduced: ATR-42 with Air Littoral

• 1973 – Pioneer 10 sends back the first close-up images of Jupiter. these photos would later be rejected on Airliners.net for “bad distance”.

• 1971 – 3-17 – Indo-Pakistan War. The Indian Air Force loses 72 aircraft and the Pakistan Air Force 94 aircraft.

• 1970 – 37 Squadron Special Flight 602; in Yukon 106922,; flew families and members of the Quebec FLQ Organization to Cuba. Their exile to Cuba was a trade off for the release of kidnapped James Cross and exemption from prosecution for the murder of Pierre Laporte.

• 1968 – First flight of the Anahuac Tauro XB-TAX.

• 1960 – A fully fueled Martin XSM-68-3-MA Titan I ICBM, 58-2254, a Lot V missile, V-2, being lowered into a silo at the Operational System Test Facility, Vandenberg AFB, California, following pre-launch tests, the ninth attempt at completing this test, drops to the bottom of the underground launch tube when the elevator fails. The missile explodes, wrecking the silo, which is never repaired. No injuries were sustained, however. This was the first silo accident.

• 1958 – An aircraft exchange, which will function like the stock markets and commodity exchanges, opens in New York.

• 1951 – A Boeing B-29A-45-BN Superfortress, 44-61797, of the 3417th AMS, 3415th AMG, Lowry AFB, Colorado, piloted by James W. Shanks, trying to reach Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colorado, with one motor not working crashed into a row of residential homes, killing eight airmen. At least one civilian and five airmen were injured. Five houses were damaged—four of them demolished.

• 1945 – A Mk5 Sea Vampire became the first jet aircraft to take off and land from an aircraft carrier, HMS Ocean.

• 1944 – A single U. S. Navy PBY Catalina picks up 56 survivors of the destroyer USS Cooper (DD-695) in Ormoc Bay and another rescues 48. Both loads break all previous records.

• 1943 – (Overnight) Japanese Rabaul-based aircraft attack U. S. ships approaching Bougainville Island.

• 1942 – A Vickers Wellington specially equipped bmber with electronic measuring equipment collects the frequency of the UHF-band airborne Lichtenstein radar used by German night fighters for the first time. The information will allow the British to field an operational jammer to counter the radar in late April 1943.

• 1934 – Charles Ulm disappears while flying over the Pacific Ocean somewhere between Oakland, California and Hawaii.

• 1928 – The prototype Curtiss XF8C-2, BuNo A7673, crashes, just days after its first flight.

• 1914 – Alec Ogilvie patents the first practical airspeed indicator. Improvements in or connected with Combined Pitot and Static Pressure Tubes. Filed 1913-12-04 • Granted 1914-12-03 • https://patents.google.com/patent/GB191327931A/en?assignee=Alec+Ogilvie

• 1910 – The first multiple fatality airplane accident in history happened at Centocelle, near Rome, when Lt. Enrico Cammarota and Private S. Castellani became the 26th and 27th people to die in a plane crash.

December 4

• 2012 – The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) approves the deployment of MIM-104 Patriot surface-to-air missiles in a 40-km (25-mile)-wide zone along Turkey's border with Syria.^[1]

• 2011 – Iran announces its capture of the CIA UAV a Lockheed Martin RQ-170 Sentinel unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), claiming to have shot it down. The United States acknowledges the loss of the UAV for the first time, but denies that it was shot down.^[2]

• 2010 – Dagestan Airlines Flight 372, a Tupolev Tu-154, skids off the runway during emergency landing at Russia's Domodedovo International Airport, killing two of the 160 passengers on board and injuring 87.

• 2003 – 2003 Polish Air Force Mi-8 crash: Operated by the 36th Special Aviation Regiment with Poland’s Prime Minister Leszek Miller on board crashed near Piaseczno, just outside of Warsaw.

• 1998 – Launch: Space Shuttle Endeavour STS-88 at 03:35:34 EST (8:35:34 GMT). Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 2A: Node 1. First Shuttle ISS assembly flight.

• 1991 – Pan Am, bankrupt since August 11, is finally dissolved after 63 years of operation.

• 1984 – Kuwait Airways Flight 221, flying from Kuwait City to Karachi, Pakistan, is hijacked by four Lebanese men and diverted to Tehran. Four hostages are killed and dumped on the tarmac, and the remaining passengers, especially Americans, are tortured every 5 min. Iranians eventually raid the aircraft and rescue all, but the hijackers were later released.

• 1983 – In reprisal to an attack on United States military bases in Beirut, 28 United States Navy A-6 Intruders attack suspected terrorist bases in Libya.

• 1977 – Malaysia Airlines Flight 653, a Boeing 737, is hijacked under mysterious circumstances; minutes later, the airliner crashes into a swamp near Tanjung Kupang, Malaysia at a steep angle, killing all 100 people aboard.

• 1976 – A fire in a hangar at HMAS Albatross (NAS Nowra), Australia, damages or destroys 12 of 13 Grumman S-2E Trackers of the Royal Australian Navy, assigned to squadrons VC851 and VS816. A 19-year old junior member of the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy later admits to arson, but is found mentally unstable at his court martial.

• 1974 – Martinair Flight 138, a Douglas DC-8 on a charter flight, crashed into a mountain shortly before landing, on approach to Katunayake, Sri Lanka for a refueling stop; killing all aboard – 182 Indonesian hajj pilgrims bound for Mecca, and 9 crew members.

• 1969 – A Boeing 707-328B operating the Caracas-Point-à-Pitre sector of Air France Flight 212, crashed into the sea shortly after takeoff from Simón Bolívar International Airport with the loss of all 62 on board.

• 1967 – The A-7 A Corsair II strike aircraft enters combat for the first time, operating from the aircraft carrier USS Ranger (CVA-61) over Vietnam.

• 1965 – The 1965 Carmel mid-air collision; Eastern Air Lines Flight 853, a Lockheed Super Constellation, collides with TWA Flight 42, a Boeing 707 over Carmel, New York; Flight 42 makes an emergency landing at John F. Kennedy International Airport; Flight 853 is forced to crash land on Hunt Mountain near Danbury, Connecticut, killing three passengers and one of the pilots on board; no casualties were reported on board Flight 42.

• 1965 – Gemini 7 launched.

• 1961 – The National Air and Space Museum receives the Douglas C-54 transport “Sacred Cow” used by US Presidents Roosevelt and Truman.

• 1959 – Ensign Albert Joe Hickman was practising aircraft carrier landings as part of a training mission conducted from Naval Air Station Miramar, California. When his McDonnell F3H Demon suddenly stalled, Hickman was still 2,000 feet (610 m) above ground. He could easily have ejected from the cockpit in time to save his own life. Below him, however, and directly in the path of the crippled plane was Hawthorne Elementary School, where more than 700 children were playing in the schoolyard. Hickman chose to remain in the cockpit. He somehow maneuvered the descending plane away from the school, assuring the safety – and probably saving the lives – of several hundred people. Now at an altitude of only 60 feet (18 m), he no longer had the option to eject. The plane crashed into a nearby canyon, exploding on impact, and Albert J. Hickman was killed. A school in the San Diego community of Mira Mesa was later named after him. American Legion Post 460 in San Diego, Department of California, is named the Albert J. Hickman Post.

• 1958 – The last Avro CF-100 was rolled from the production line at Malton, Ontario.

• 1958 – First flight of the Baade B-152 V1 Prototype

• 1955 – Glenn L. Martin, founder of the Glenn L. Martin Company, dies at age 69.

• 1952 – First flight of the Grumman S-2 Tracker

• 1950 – A Pan American World Airways Boeing 307 Strato-Clipper sets a new record time for a commercial flight from Honolulu, Hawaii, to Los Angeles California, making the trip in 7 hours 20 min.

• 1945 – Roberta Bondar, Canadian astronaut, was born. Roberta Lynn Bondar, PhD, DSc, MD, is Canada’s first woman astronaut and the world’s first neurologist in space.

• 1945 – A de Havilland Sea Vampire Mk 5 became the first jet aircraft to intentionally take off and land from an aircraft carrier, HMS Ocean.

• 1944 – First flight of the Bristol Brigand

• 1943 – U. S. Navy carrier aircraft strike Kwajalein Atoll. Those from USS Essex (CV-9) and USS Lexington (CV-16) concentrate on Roi, where they shoot down 28 Japanese aircraft and destroy 19 on the ground, sink a large cargo ship, and damage the light cruiser Isuzu; those from USS Enterprise (CV-6) and USS Yorktown (CV-10) strike Kwajalein Island, where they destroy 18 float planes, sink three merchant ships, and damage the light cruiser Nagara. A combined total of five American aircraft are lost. Twenty-nine Yorktown aircraft raid Wotje later in the day. Japanese aircraft attack the retiring carrier force during the afternoon and overnight, damaging Lexington with a torpedo in exchange for the loss of 29 Japanese planes.

• 1943 – The U. S. Navy submarine USS Sailfish (SS-192) torpedoes and sinks the Japanese aircraft carrier Chūyō near Hachijōjima with the loss of over 1,243 lives, including 20 American prisoners-of-war.

• 1942 – USAAF bombers make their first raid on Italy.

• 1940 – Operational control of RAF Coastal Command is transferred to the Royal Navy, although Coastal Command remains part of the Royal Air Force. Air protection of British merchant shipping soon begins to improve.

• 1938 – First flight of the Miles M.18

• 1930 – Canadian Cub I was first flown for 90 min, at Montréal/Saint-Hubert Airport, by E. J. Cooper.

• 1929 – Curtiss B-2 Condor, 29-28, assigned to the 96th Bomb Squadron, Langley Field, Virginia, crashes at Goodwater, Alabama, with 69 total flight hours on airframe. Pilots 2nd Lt. James M. Gillespie and Ernest G. Schmidt KWF. This was the second of three crashes of the 13 total B-2s the USAAC acquired.

• 1912 – Pappy Boyington, American pilot, is born (d. 1988). Colonel Gregory “Pappy” Boyington, USMC, was an American fighter ace. He commanded the famous U. S. Marine Corps squadron, VMF-214 (“The Black Sheep Squadron”) during World War II. Boyington became a prisoner of war later in the war. He was awarded the Navy Cross and the Medal of Honor.

• 1908 – The Englishman John Moore-Brabazon, 1st Baron Brabazon of Tara makes a flight of 1,350 feet (410 m) in a Voisin biplane at Issy-les-Moulineaux in France. He becomes one of the guiding lights of early British aviation and is issued the first British pilot’s license, then called an aviator’s certificate.

• 1894 – German meteorologist Arthur Berson climbs up with a balloon to 9,155 metres (30,036 ft).

December 5

• 2008 – A MiG-29 crash at Chita in the district of Zabaykalsky Krai, Siberia at 0612 hrs. Moscow time, kills the pilot.

• 2006 – Lufthansa becomes the first airline to order the Boeing 747-8 passenger jet with an order for 20 planes and options for an additional 20 planes.

• 2005 – Southwest Airlines Flight 1248, a Boeing 737-7 H4 with 103 people on board, slides off a runway while landing in a snowstorm at Chicago Midway International Airport in Chicago, Illinois; 11 people on the aircraft are injured. The plane strikes at least three cars in a busy intersection; a six-year-old boy is killed and several people are injured in the cars.

• 2001 – Launch: Space Shuttle Endeavour STS-108 at 22:19:28 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS supply, crew rotation.

• 1997 – Russian Air Force Antonov An-124 Ruslan, RA-82005, delivering two Sukhoi Su-27 Flankers to Vietnam, loses both port engines at 200 feet (60 m) on take-off from Irkutsk, crashing into residential area, killing eight crew, 15 passengers, and 45 on the ground (some accounts list higher ground casualties). Cause was thought to be either contaminated fuel or wrong grade of fuel, taken on at Irkutsk.

• 1994 – A U.S. Navy pilot from Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida, is killed when he loses control of his Beechcraft T-34C Turbo Mentor near Robertsdale, Alabama.

• 1988 – A U.S. Navy Grumman EA-6B Prowler, BuNo 163044, 'NG', of VAQ-139, goes missing over the Pacific Ocean during training exercise 900 miles off San Diego. Search fails to find any sign of the four crew.

• 1972 – During an Aerospace Defense Command night training mission, Convair F-102A-80-CO Delta Dagger, 56-1517, of the 157th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron, South Carolina Air National Guard, McEntire Air National Guard Base, South Carolina, collided with Lockheed C-130E Hercules, 64-0558, of the 318th Special Operations Squadron, out of Pope AFB, North Carolina, during a simulated interception, over the Bayboro area of Horry County, east of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. One killed in the Delta Dagger, Capt. Thomas C. Hagood, Jr. of Lexington, South Carolina, and all twelve aboard the Hercules perish. They were Lt. Col. Donald E. Martin, of White Oak, Texas; Maj. Keith L. Van Note, of Mason City, Iowa; Capt. John R. Cole, of Tulsa, Oklahoma; Capt. Louis R. Sert, of St. Louis, Missouri; Capt. Marshall K. Dickerson, of Chicago; Lt. Douglas L. Theirer, address unavailable; T.Sgt. Robert E. Doyle, of South Hill, Virginia; T.Sgt. Claude L. Abbot, of Adel, Georgia; S.Sgt. Gilmore A. Minkley, Jr., of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania; Sgt. Billy M. Warr, Sr., of Sylmar, California; Sgt. Gerald K. Faust, of Oregon, Wisconsin; and Capt. Douglas S. Peterson, of Harvard, Illinois. Some press reports list Conway, South Carolina, west of the crash site, as the location.

• 1965 – Douglas A-4E Skyhawk, BuNo 151022, of VA-56 on nuclear alert status, armed with one Mark 43 TN nuclear weapon, rolls off of elevator of aircraft carrier USS Ticonderoga (CVA-14), in the Pacific Ocean. The Skyhawk was being rolled from the number 2 hangar bay to the number 2 elevator when it was lost. Airframe, pilot Lt. D.M. Webster, and bomb are lost in 16,000 feet of water 80 miles from one of the Ryukyu Islands in Okinawa.] Webster, from Warren, Ohio, was a 1964 graduate of the Ohio State University. No public mention was made of the incident at the time and it would not come to light until a 1981 Pentagon report revealed that a one-megaton bomb had been lost. Japan then asks for details of the incident.

• 1964 – An LGM-30B Minuteman I missile is on strategic alert at Launch Facility (LF) L-02, Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota, when two airmen are dispatched to the LF to repair the inner zone (IZ) security system. In the midst of their checkout of the IZ system, one retrorocket in the spacer below the Reentry Vehicle (RV) fires, causing the RV to fall about 75 feet to the floor of the silo. When the RV strikes bottom, the arming and fusing/attitude control subsystem containing the batteries are torn loose, thus removing all sources of power from the RV. The RV structure receives considerable damage. All safety devices operate properly in that they do not sense the proper sequence of events to allow arming the warhead. There is no detonation or radioactive contamination.

• 1956 – An Northrop XSM-62 Snark, 53-8172, N-69D test model, fitted with new 24 hour stellar inertial guidance system, launches from Cape Canaveral Missile Test Annex, Florida, wanders off-course, ignores destruct command, disappears over Brazil. It is found by a farmer in January 1983.

• 1961 – A U. S. Navy McDonnell F4H-1 Phantom II sets a sustained altitude record of 66,443.8 feet (20,252.1 m).

• 1945 – Flight 19 was the designation of five TBM Avenger torpedo bombers that disappeared during a United States Navy-authorized overwater navigation training flight from Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale, Florida. All 14 airmen on the flight were lost, as were all 13 crew members of a PBM Mariner flying boat assumed to have exploded in mid-air while searching for the flight. Navy investigators could not determine the cause for the loss of Flight 19 but said the aircraft may have become disoriented and ditched in rough seas after running out of fuel.

• 1944 – British Douglas Dakota III aircraft, serial number FL588, of the Royal Air Force crashed on the Pic de la Camisette, a mountain close to the commune of Mijanès, Ariège, in the French Pyrenees. The Dakota was piloted by three RAF pilots. In total twenty-three airmen were on board, including twenty members of the Glider Pilot Regiment. Only six airmen survived the incident; sixteen died in the crash, another died within hours from his injuries. In spite of serious wounds, two of the survivors managed to reach the village of Mijanès to get help for the other survivors. The bodies of eleven men were recovered from the crash site between 10 and 19 December, and buried in Mijanès. The search was suspended due to adverse weather conditions, but in the spring of 1945 a further six bodies were brought down from the crash site after the snow had melted. All of the airmen who died in the crash were later reburied in the Mazargues War Cemetery, Marseilles. Remains of Dakota FL 588 have been preserved and today are on display at the Château d'Usson, a ruined medieval Castle noted for its association with the Cathars.

• 1942 – Canadian Vickers prototype of the Consolidated Canso was test flown at St Hubert Quebec, by ECW Dobbin and crew.

• 1941 – First flight of the Kawanishi E15K Shiun (“Violet Cloud”), Allied reporting name “Norm”

• 1931 – Lowell Bayles, winner of the 1931 Thompson Trophy, dies when the Gee Bee Model Z racer he is piloting crashes during a speed run at Wayne County Airport in Detroit, Michigan.

• 1921 – The first regular air services in Australia commence, with West Australian Airways.

• 1919 – Avianca is founded as the Sociedad Colombo-Alemana de Transporte AéreoinBarranquilla.

• 1909 – George Taylor becomes the first person to fly a heavier-than-air craft in Australia, in a glider he designed. On the same day Florence Taylor becomes the first woman in Australia to fly a heavier-than-air craft, in the glider designed by her husband.

December 6

• 2022 - The last Boeing 747 left the company's widebody factory in Washington on December 6, 2022, ahead of its delivery to Atlas Air in early 2023.

• 2012 – A Brazilian Air Force AMX has collided with power lines in the state of Santa Catarina.The pilot died.

• 2007 – a French Air Force twin-seat Dassault Rafale aircraft with a single occupant, on a training flight from the Saint-Dizier base, crashes in an uninhabited part of the Neuvic parish in the Corrèze area, with the loss of its pilot.

• 2005 – An Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force Lockheed C-130E Hercules, 5-8519, c/n 4399, crashes into an apartment building in Tehran, Iran. Ninety-four people on board were killed as well as 14 in the building.

• 1997 – A Russian Antonov An-124 transport cargo plane crashes into an apartment complex near Irkutsk, Siberia, and killing 67.

• 1993 – First flight of the Bombardier 415.

• 1991 – First flight of the Dornier 328.

• 1990 – An Italian Air Force Aermacchi MB-326 jet, of 603 SC, crashes into a high school in Casalecchio di Reno, Italy. Twelve students are killed, 84 more are severely injured. The pilot ejected after losing control of the plane.

• 1989 – The prototype of the Boeing MH-47E Chinook special operations helicopter rolls out.

• 1988 – A USAF Boeing B-52H-150-BW Stratofortress, 60-0040, crashed on the runway at 0115 hrs. EST at K.I. Sawyer AFB, Michigan, while doing touch-and-goes after a seven-hour training flight. No weapons were aboard the bomber, which broke into three parts. All crew survived, crawling or being helped from the nose section, without sustaining burns.

• 1984 – PBA Flight 1039, an Embraer 110 Bandeirante with 13 passengers and crew on board, crashes on takeoff at Jacksonville, Florida, killing all aboard.

• 1982 – A Hungarian Air Force Antonov An-26 "Curl" crashes at Szentkirályszabadja, one of six on strength.

• 1975 – The first airmail flight by a supersonic aircraft is made by the Tupolev Tu-144, carrying mail between Moscow and Alma Ata, within the U. S. S. R.

• 1966 – The West German Luftwaffe grounds its fleet of F-104 s to investigate continuing accidents with the type.

• 1966 – First flight of the Shenyang BA-5

• 1960 – Brazil commissions its first aircraft carrier, Minas Gerais. She is the second Latin American aircraft carrier to enter service.

• 1959 – Flying a McDonnell F4 H-1 Phantom II, by Navy Commander Lawrence E. Flint sets a new world altitude record of 98,556 feet (30,040 m) in Operation Top Flight.

• 1957 – First flight of the Lockheed L-188 Electra

• 1955 – First flight of the Bensen B-8

• 1952 – 1952 Bermuda air crash: A Cubana de Aviación Douglas DC-4 crashes into the Atlantic Ocean off Bermuda after failing to gain altitude after takeoff, killing 37 of 41 on board.

• 1950 – C-47 Dakotas of 13 Flight Royal Hellenic Air Force evacuate US casualties from the Chonjin Reservoir.

• 1944 – First flight of the Heinkel He 162. First prototype Heinkel He 162 V1 Spatz (sparrow, Hainkel factory name for design), or "Volksjager" ("Peoples' Fighter"), loses wheel-well doors on first flight due to improper bonding. Nonetheless, flight testing is not delayed for a thorough inspection, and on another flight in front of German high brass on 10 December, V1 starboard wing comes apart in high-speed, low-level pass, killing pilot, Flugkapitän Gotthard Peter. Starboard aileron breaks away, taking part of wingtip with it, followed by failure of wing's leading edge. Aircraft corkscrews down and crashes on the perimeter of the airfield. Cause was defective wing bonding. Adhesive used, Dynamit, was substitute for Tego film glue used previously, but factory producing it was destroyed in RAF attack on Wuppertal. Substitute glue problem causing structural failure also affected Focke-Wulf Ta 154 and other late-war German aviation projects depending on bonded wooden components.

• 1944 – Lockheed XF-14 Shooting Star, 44-83024, c/n 080-1003, originally YP-80A No 2, redesignated during production, of the 4144th Base Unit, destroyed in mid-air collision with B-25J-20-NC, 44-29120, of the 421st Base Unit, near Muroc Army Air Base, California. All crew on both planes killed, coming down 7 miles SSW of Randsburg, California. XF-14 pilot was Perry B. Claypool, while Henry M. Phillips flew the B-25

• 1944 – During the evening, the Japanese mount a paratrooper attack on U. S. airfields on Leyte, employing 39 or 40 aircraft to drop 15 to 20 paratroopers each. The aircraft targeting Tacloban airfield are shot down or driven off by U. S. antiaircraft fire, while the troops targeting Dulag Airfield are killed in crash landings, but troops dropped from 35 aircraft at Burauen airfield resist for two days and three nights until killed by U. S. Army Air Forces ground personnel.

• 1943 – USAAF Douglas A-20G-20-DO Havoc, 42-86782, of the 649th Bomb Squadron, 411th Bomb Group (Light), out of Florence Army Airfield, South Carolina, crashed near Woodruff, Spartanburg County, South Carolina, three miles E of Switzer. Pilot 2nd Lt. Hampton P. Worrell, 26, (b. 27 September 1917 in South Carolina), gunners Sgt. Harry G. Barnes, 19, (b. 22 September 1924 in New York) and Sgt. John D. Hickman, 21, (b. 31 December 1923 in California), all killed.

• 1936 – Nationalist aircraft bomb Barcelona, Spain.

• 1928 – North American Aviation Inc. is founded.

• 1917 – Chikuhei Nakajima and Seibi Kawanishi found the Japan Aeroplane Manufacturing Work Company Ltd. It is the first aircraft manufacturing company in Japan.

• 1907 – First flight of the AEA Cygnet, a tethered glider (also referred to as a kite) designed by Alexander Graham Bell. The flight is also the first flight for Thomas Selfridge, later killed in the crash of a powered aircraft.

December 7

• 2020 - United States Air Force Test pilot Chuck Yeager, the first pilot to ever break the sound barrier, dies at age 97 in Los Angeles, California.

• 2012 – A missile fired by an American unmanned aerial vehicle strikes a house near Mir AliinNorth Waziristan, Pakistan, killing senior al-Qaeda leader Sheik Khalid Bin Abdel Rehman Al-Hussainan, also known as Abu-Zaid al Kuwaiti, while he is eating breakfast. The attack also mortally wounds his wife, and injures his daughter.^[1][2][3]

• 2009 – SA Airlink Flight 8625, operated by Embraer ERJ 135 ZS-SJW, overruns the runway at George Airport, South Africa, arriving from Cape Town. The aircraft sustains substantial damage when it runs down a bank onto a road and may be declared a write-off.

• 2005 – A man named Rigoberto Alpizar, intending on American Airlines Flight 924 in Miami, is killed in the jetway by air marshalls after he threatened to have a bomb in his backpack. He moved towards the backpack, refusing to comply with the officers’ orders to stop, and was shot. It was the first time since before 9/11 that an air marshall had used a firearm on duty.

• 1999 – Asian Spirit Flight 100, a Let L-410 Turbolet, crashes into a mountain while on approach to Cauayan Airport, killing all 15 passengers and crew on board.

• 1995 – The 1995 Air St. Martin Beech 1900 crash, near Belle-Anse, Haiti, kills all 20 on board.

• 1995 – The Galileo spacecraft arrives at Jupiter, just more than six years after it was launched by Space Shuttle Atlantis during Mission STS-34.

• 1990 – An Alaskan Airlines Boeing 727 takes off from Seattle International Airport in visibility of only 500 ft (150 m), the lowest for any airliner takeoff in the US.

• 1987 – Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771, a BAe 146, is hijacked and deliberately crashed near Cayucos, California, by a disgruntled airline employee. All 43 people on board, including the hijacker, are killed.

• 1986 – David Burke, an angry former employee of USAir, the parent company of Pacific Southwest Airlines, shoots both pilots of Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771, a BAe 146, while it is cruising at 22,000 ft (6,700 m) over the central California coast. No longer under control, the plane pitches forward and accelerates, crashing into the ground at a speed of around 700 mph (1,100 km/h) near Cayucos, California, killing all 43 people on board.

• 1983 – In the Madrid Runway Disaster, an Iberia Airways 727 collides on a runway at Madrid-Barajas Airport with an Aviaco DC-9. 51 persons on the Iberia aircraft and all 42 people on board the Aviaco plane are killed in the accident.

• 1981 – Introduction: Mitsubishi F-15J with Japan Air Self-Defense Force

• 1980 – Pan Am's Boeing 747, the China Clipper, arrives from JFK International AirportinNew York, to Beijing, after a stop in Tokyo. It marks the first time since 1949 that a commercial flight between the United States and mainland China is completed.

• 1972 – Apollo 17, the last Apollo moon mission, is launched. The crew take the photograph known as “The Blue Marble” as they leave the Earth.

• 1977 – Lockheed U-2R, 68-10330, Article 052, second airframe of first R-model order, originally registered N809X, delivered to the 100th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing 25 July 1968. Testbed for Senior Lance and U.S. Navy EP-X trials. To 9th SRW in 1976. Crashed this date at RAF Akrotiri, Cyprus, (Operating Area OH), pilot Capt. Robert Henderson killed when he crashes into the Met Office next to the control tower on take-off. Also killed are British duty forecaster Jack Flawn and four locally employed Cypriot staff, as well as 14 other injuries. Fires burn for three hours. The Met Office staff were the first to be killed on duty in peacetime since M.A. Giblett died on the R101 in October 1930.

• 1966 – US Army Grumman OV-1B Mohawk, 62-5894, of the 122nd Aviation Company, on photo mission out of Fleigerhorst AAF, Hanau, Germany, is written off after engine failure then fire. Pilot Capt. Bill Ebert and crewman SP4 Ken Bakos eject. Aircraft crashes in a small forest outside the town of Volkartshain.

• 1962 – First flight of the Aérospatiale Super Frelon.

• 1956 – A Soviet Navy Ilyushin Il-28U of the 50th Guards Independent Reconnaissance Regiment (based in Primorsky Krai) crashes into a mountain. Crew of three dies.

• 1956 – Avro Shackleton MR.3, WR970, first flown 2 September 1955, and operated by Avro for stall-warning development, crashes while on local flight out of Woodford Airport (WFD/EGCD), United Kingdom; spirals into ground near Foolow, killing all four crew.

• 1955 – First prototype Martin XP6M-1 Seamaster, BuNo 138821, c/n XP-1, first flown July 14, 1955, disintegrates in flight at 5,000 feet (1,500 m) due to horizontal tail going to full up in control malfunction, subjecting airframe to 9 G stress as it began an outside loop, crashing into Potomac River near junction of St. Mary's River, killing four crew, pilot Navy Lieutenant Commander Utgoff, and Martin employees, Morris Bernhard, assistant pilot, Herbert Scudder, flight engineer, and H.B. Coulon, flight test engineer.

• 1951 – The 6555th Guided Missile Squadron at Cape Canaveral, Florida, launches Martin B-61 Matador, GM-547. Lift-off and flight were normal, but the missile did not respond properly to guidance signals, and it finally went out of control and fell into the Atlantic 15 minutes and 20 seconds after launch. The flight covered a distance of 105 miles.

• 1945 – New Zealand National Airways Corporation is founded with amalgamation of Union Airways, Air Travel and Cook Strait Airways.

• 1944 – The sole Northrop JB-1A Bat, unofficially known as the "Thunderbug" due to the improvised General Electric B-1 turbojets' "peculiar squeal", a jet-propelled flying wing spanning 28 feet 4 inches (8.64 m) to carry 2,000 lb (910 kg) bombs in pods close to the engines, makes its first powered, but unmanned, flight from Santa Rosa Island, Eglin Field, Florida, launching from a pair of rails laid across the sand dunes. It climbs rapidly, stalls, and crashes 400 yards from the launch point.

• 1944 – A major earthquake in Japan badly damages aircraft factories, including the Aichi factory, the Mitsubishi plant at Nagoya, and the Nakajima plant at Handa.

• 1944 – Employing a new tactic in which torpedo bombers first drop a torpedo and then conduct a kamikaze suicide attack, Japanese aircraft sink a U. S. destroyer and destroyer-transport in Ormoc Bay. Kamikazes also severely damage two destroyers.

• 1944 – The Convention on International Civil Aviation is signed in Chicago, Illinois.

• 1942 – First flight of the Bell P-63 Kingcobra

• 1941 – Canada declares war on Japan and immediate steps were taken to strengthen the Pacific Coast defenses.

• 1941 – No. 419 (Bomber) Squadron was formed in England.

• 1941 – First flight of the Nakajima A6 M2-N

• 1941 – The Imperial Japanese Navy makes a devastatingly successful surprise attack on the US Navy fleet at Pearl Harbor. Six aircraft carriers launched a total of nearly 400 warplanes which claimed five US battleships and ten other vessels, and damaged three other battleships. The US declares war on Japan.

• 1940 – First flight of the Fairey Barracuda prototype P1767.

• 1936 – First Boeing Y1B-17, 36-149, c/n 1973, first flown 2 December, makes a rough landing at Boeing Field, Seattle, Washington, on third flight, when Army pilot Stanley Umstead touches down with locked brakes, airframe ends up on nose after short skid. Pilot had used heavy brake applications before take-off, then immediately retracted the overheated undercarriage instead of letting air stream cool it, whereupon the bi-metal brakes fused. Repaired, Flying Fortress departs for Wright Field on 11 January 1937.

• 1928 – First flight of the de Havilland Hawk Moth

• 1926 – A Stinson Detroiter being delivered to Canadian Air Express is the first airplane inspected (and passed) by the Federal Government.

• 1922 – DH-4B, AS-63780, departs Rockwell Field, San Diego, California at 0905 hrs bound for Fort Huachuca, Arizona, piloted by 1st Lt. Charles L. Webber with Col. Francis C. Marshall aboard for an inspection trip of cavalry posts and camps. When plane never arrives, one of the largest man-hunts in Air Service history is mounted but when search is finally given up on 23 February 1923 nothing had been found. Wreckage is eventually discovered 12 May 1923 by a man hunting stray cattle in the mountains. Flight apparently hit Cuyamaca Peak just a few miles east of San Diego in fog within thirty minutes of departure.

• 1913 – A Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.2a, 235, flown by factory test pilot Lt. Norman Spratt, crashes at the Farnborough Aerodrome, pilot surviving.

December 8

• 2009 – In the United Kingdom, Coventry Airport announces that it is to close with immediate effect due to its owners being wound up in the High Court.

• 2009 – A Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force Sikorsky HH-60H Seahawk Helicopter crashed and sank off the coast of Nagasaki. Two crewmembers were killed, while a third was rescued.

• 2008 – San Diego F/A-18 crash was the crash of a United States Marine Corps (USMC) F/A-18 Hornet in a residential suburb of San Diego, California. The pilot, First Lieutenant Dan Neubauer (28) from VMFAT-101, was the only crewmember on board the two-seat aircraft; he ejected successfully, landing in a tree. The jet crashed into the University City residential area, destroying two houses and damaging a third. A total of 4 residents in one house, two women and two children, were killed.

• 2006 – First flight of the Boeing X-53 Active Aeroelastic Wing.

• 2005 – Southwest Airlines Flight 1248, a Boeing 737-700, slides off the runway during landing at Chicago Midway International Airport in Chicago in heavy snow. None of the people on board are injured, but the plane hits two automobiles on the ground, killing a six-year-old boy.

• 1988 – Remscheid A-10 crash occurred when a United States Air Force attack jet, an A-10 Thunderbolt II crashed onto a residential area in the city of Remscheid, West Germany. The aircraft crashed into the upper floor of an apartment complex. In addition to the pilot, five people were killed. Fifty others were injured, including many seriously.

• 1987 – Alianza Lima air disaster: A Peruvian Navy Fokker F27-400 M chartered by Peruvian football club Alianza Lima crashes in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Peru. The aircraft was having mechanical difficulties and executed a flyby of the control tower so it could be visually confirmed that his landing gear was down and locked. Once proven it he affirmative, the aircraft went to go around to land, lost altitude and hit the water. Of the 44 people on board, only one of the pilots survived.

• 1983 – Landed: Space shuttle Columbia STS-9 at 18:47:24 EDT (23:47:24 UTC) Edwards AFB, Runway 17. Mission highlights: First Spacelab mission.

• 1972 – United Airlines Flight 553, a Boeing 737, crashes after aborting its landing attempt at Chicago Midway International Airport, killing 43 of 60 people on board and 2 people on the ground; among those killed was Dorothy Hunt, wife of Watergate conspirator E. Howard Hunt. The crash is the first fatal crash involving the 737-200.

• 1972 – Seven members of the Eritrean Liberation Front attempt to hijack Ethiopian Airlines Flight 708, a Boeing 720-060 B with 87 other people on board, minutes after it departs Haile Selassie I International Airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Security guards on board open fire, killing six of them and mortally wounding the seventh. There are no other fatalities.

• 1972 – Pakistan International Airlines Flight 631 entered a heavy rainstorm on approach to Rawalpindi and crashed into a hillside. The airliner broke into three pieces. All 26 people aboard perished on the hillside.

• 1969 – Olympic Airways Flight 954, a DC-6, crashed into Mt. Parnes while on approach to Athens-Ellinikon International Airport. All 90 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 1968 – Lunar Landing Training Vehicle No. 1 crashes at Ellington AFB, Texas. NASA Manned Spacecraft Center test pilot Joseph Algranti ejects safely.

• 1967 – The first African-American NASA astronaut, Maj. Robert Henry Lawrence, Jr., is killed in the crash of a Lockheed F-104D Starfighter, 57-1327, of the 6515th Organizational Maintenance Squadron, while practicing zoom landings with Maj. Harvey Royer at Edwards AFB, California. Lawrence was flying backseat on the mission as the instructor pilot for a flight test trainee learning the steep-descent glide technique intended for the cancelled Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar program. The pilot of the aircraft successfully ejected and survived the accident, but with major injuries. The F-104 they were flying came in too low and hit the runway. Royer ejected, but Lawrence was killed. He left behind a wife and one son.

• 1965 – Introduction: McDonnell Douglas DC-9

• 1964 – A United Lines Caravelle makes the first landing in the USA completely controlled by computer (automatic touchdown).

• 1964 – USAF Convair B-58A-15-CF Hustler, 60-1116, of the 305th Bomb Wing, taxiing for take-off on icy taxiway at Bunker Hill AFB, Indiana, is blown off the pavement by exhaust of another departing Convair B-58 Hustler, strikes a concrete manhole box adjacent to the runway, landing gear collapses, burns. Navigator killed in failed ejection, two other crew okay. Four B43 nuclear bombs and either a W39 or W53 warhead are on board the weapons pod, but no explosion takes place and contamination is limited to crash site.]

• 1963 – Lightning strikes the Pan American World Airways Boeing 707-121 Clipper Tradewind, operating as Pan Am Flight 214, igniting fuel vapor and causing an explosion which blows part of the left wing off the aircraft. The plane crashes near Elkton, Maryland, killing all 81 people on board. As a result of the tragedy, the U. S. Federal Aviation Administration orders the installation of lightning discharge wicks or static dischargers on all commercial jets flying inside U. S. airspace.

• 1962 – British troops are airlifted to Borneo to quell uprisings in the region

• 1962 – First flight of the Bell 206 (206)

• 1949 – Muroc Army Airfield is renamed Edwards Air Force Base in honor of test pilot Glen Edwards.

• 1945 – First flight of the Bell 47 prototype NC1 H

• 1944 – In an attempt to stop Japanese air attacks on Saipan from staging through Iwo Jima, the U. S. Army Air Forces and U. S. Navy conduct a joint attack against Iwo Jima. After a morning fighter sweep by 28 P-38 Lightnings, 62 B-29 s and 102 B-24 s bomb the island, dropping 814 tons (738,456 kg) of bombs, after which U. S. Navy surface ships bombard Iwo Jima. All Iwo Jima airfields are operational by December 11, but Japanese attacks on Saipan come to a halt for 2½ weeks. Seventh Air Force B-24 s will continue to raid Iwo Jima at least once a day through February 15, 1945.

• 1943 – Aircraft from the U. S. Navy carriers USS Bunker Hill (CV-17) and USS Monterey (CVL-26) strike Nauru in cooperation with a bombardment by surafce warships; eight or ten of the 12 Japanese planes on the island are destroyed.

• 1941 – Randall “Duke” Cunningham, US Navy fighter pilot and Congressman, was born.

• 1941 – The United States declares war on Japan.

• 1941 – Japanese air attacks destroy half the aircraft of the United States Army Air Forces’ Far East Air Force in the Philippine Islands. Japanese aircraft also begin attacks on Hong Kong, Guam, and Wake Island.

• 1940 – The New York City experiences its first blackout and anti-aircraft exercise, around the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

• 1938 – The Arado Ar 196 V4, D-OVMB, the second Ar 196B, with a single main float and two outrigger floats, suffers failure of engine mounts during taxi testing at Travemünde for seaworthiness trials. Engine drops down towards centreline float, fire breaks out, crew of two with Helmut Schuster at the controls goes over the starboard side to avoid flames. This test sealed the fate of the center float Ar 196.

• 1938 – Deutsche Werke launches Germany’s first aircraft carrier, Graf Zeppelin, at Kiel. She will never be completed.

• 1936 – Spanish Republican pilots flying Soviet-made fighters shoot down a plane carrying International Red Cross envoy Georges Henny over northern Spain while Henny is carrying a report on the Paracuellos massacre of Nationalists by Republicans that he intends to present to the League of Nations. The crash badly injures Henny, preventing his report to the League, and fatally injures the French Paris Soir correspondent Louis Delaprée.

• 1934 – Imperial Airways extends its airmail service to Australia.

• 1927 – Prototype Curtiss XB-2 Condor, 26-211, assigned to Wright Field, Ohio in October 1927, crashes at Buffalo, New York after having logged only 58 hours, 55 minutes flying time.

• 1903 – Second attempt by Charles Manly to fly Langley’s repaired full-sized aerodrome. As with the October 7 attempt the machine failed to fly tripping on its launch gear and somersaulting into the Potomac River nearly killing Manly. A surviving photograph captures the machine upended on its side as it falls off the houseboat. Langley himself was absent at this attempt but the machine’s failure to fly ended his government (i. e. U. S. Army) funded attempts at building a successful full sized man-carrying flying machine.

December 9

• 2012 – An American unmanned aerial vehicle fires a missile into a house in Tabbi in North Waziristan, Pakistan, killing the al-Qaeda commander Mohammad Ahmed al-Mansoor.^[1]

• 2012 – Ten minutes after takeoff, during a domestic flight in Mexico from MonterreytoToluca, Learjet 25 N345MC, carrying Mexican-American singer and reality television star Jenni Rivera and six other people, loses contact with air traffic controllers, enters a rapid descent from 35,000 feet (10,688 m) to 9,000 feet (2,743 m), and crashes in a remote, mountainous area in Nuevo León near Iturbide, killing everyone on board.^[2]

• 2006 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discoverys STS-116 at 01:47:35 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 12A.1: P5 Truss & Spacehab-SM, crew rotation.

• 2005 – The Venus Express, the first exploration mission of the European Space Agency, launched from Kazakhstan. It arrived on Venus the following April, and is funded to continue to send back data until December of 2012.

• 2004 – The U. S. Army issues a request for proposals (RFP) for the Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH).

• 2004 – AH-64A Apache 91-0012 from A Company, 1–151st Aviation Regiment hit a UH-60L Black Hawk 82-23668 from N Company/4-278th ACR on the ground at a Mosul base, killing the two Apache pilots and wounding four soldiers on board the Black Hawk. Both helicopters destroyed

• 2003 – Two Belgian Air Force F-16A collide near Havelange. One pilot ejects safely, the other is killed.

• 2002 – United Airlines files for Chapter 11 reorganization, the largest airline bankruptcy in US history.

• 2002 – First flight of the Diamond DA42

• 1999 – TAESA Flight 725, a DC-9 (registered XA-TKN), crashed a few minutes after leaving the Uruapan airport en route to Mexico City, killing all 18 on board. It was determined that the pilots had not completed the proper checklist prior to departure and became disoriented, raising the nose to a high attitude on takeoff. This caused a stall from which they were unable to recover.

• 1999 – During a "Fast Rope" training exercise, a Boeing-Vertol CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter of HMM-166 departs the USS Bonhomme Richard and approaches the fantail landing pad of the USNS Pecos, cruising ~15 miles (24 km) WSW of Point Loma, California at 1316 hrs. The port rear landing gear leg of the helicopter snags a safety net on the deck edge and the chopper tips backwards into the Pacific, sinking within five seconds. Eleven of 18 on board escape and are picked up by Navy SEALS following the USNS Pecos in zodiac boats. The bodies of six U.S. Marines and one U.S. Navy corpsman, from the 1st Force Recon, 5th Platoon, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, based at Camp Pendleton, California, are recovered from a depth of 3,600 feet.

• 1999 – The last Classic 737 is rolled off the Renton, Wash., assembly line, ending a production run of 1,988 airplanes.

• 1988 – First flight of the Saab JAS 39 Gripen

• 1983 – Delta Air Lines receives the 1,000th production Boeing 737atBoeing's headquarters.

• 1982 – Aeronor Flight 304, a Fairchild F-27, crashes near La Florida Airport, Chile; all 46 on board are killed.

• 1970 – Artem Mikoyan dies, aged 65

• 1967 – Launch of the Apollo 4 mission, an unmanned Saturn V, the largest launch vehicle ever to fly successfully.

• 1961 – USAF Major Robert M White takes the X-15 to a height of 30,970 m (101,610 ft).

• 1958 – B-52E-85-BO Stratofortress, 56-0633, c/n 17316, of the 11th Bomb Wing, crashes near Altus AFB, Oklahoma, due to improper use of stabilizer trim during an overshoot. Returning from a routine night training mission, aircraft makes a GCA approach, requests climb to altitude for another penetration, experiences stab trim problems, crashes ~four miles from base at 2345 hrs. Pilot Major Byard F. Baker, 39, of Azle, Texas, ejects; eight other crew die.

• 1958 – U.S. Army Major General Bogardus Snowden "Bugs" Cairns was killed instantly when his Bell H-13 Sioux helicopter crashed minutes after takeoff in dense woods northwest of Fort Rucker, Alabama headquarters. He was en route to Matteson Range to observe a firepower rehearsal in preparation for a full-scale armed helicopter display. He was commander of the Aviation Center and Commandant of the Aviation School. Ozark Army Airfield at Fort Rucker was subsequently renamed Cairns Army Airfield in his honor in January 1959. H-13 was taking off from field site when it hit a wire extended between two tents causing pilot to lose control and fly into trees.

• 1957 – Introduced: Lockheed C-130 Hercules.

• 1956 – Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 810, a Canadair North Star, crashes near Hope, British Columbia, Canada, killing all 62 people on board; the wreckage is located several months later. Aboard were four members of the Canadian Football League Saskatchewan Roughriders, and former Iowa Hawkeye Outland Trophy winner Cal Jones.

• 1955 – A USAF Republic F-84F-45-RE Thunderstreak, 52–6692, based at RAF Sculthorpe, suffers flame-out and after several failed attempts at a relight, the pilot, Lt. Roy G. Evans, 24, ejects at 3,500 feet. The fighter comes down on the Lodge Moor Infectious Diseases Hospital on the outskirts of Sheffield at 1700 hrs., striking two wards, killing one patient, Mrs. Elsie Murdock, 46, of South Road, Sheffield, and injuring seven others. Fires are under control by 1930 hrs.

• 1951 – First flight of the Fiat G.80, Italy's first true jet.

• 1944 – No. 664 (air observation post) Squadron was formed at Andover, England. The flying personnel came from the Royal Canadian Artillery and other personnel from the RCAF.

• 1942 – (9 – 18) U. S. Army Air Forces B-17 Flying Fortresses conduct the first major air strike against the Japanese airfield at Munda Point on New Georgia in the Solomon Islands. Air strikes against the airfield become routine thereafter.

• 1940 – No. 2 Squadron was formed at Digby, Lincolnshire, England on the renumbering of No. 112 (AC) Squadron.

• 1937 – PO3/c Kanichi Kashimura, of the 13th Air Group, Imperial Japanese Navy, downs a Curtiss Hawk Model 75 over Nanchang, China during combat in a Mitsubishi A5M, '4-115', then collides with another aircraft (an unknown type that could have been either Chinese or Japanese), tearing off the outer third of his port wing. Through skillful piloting, he brings damaged aircraft back to base at Shanghai, China, and makes four landing attempts. On final approach, the fighter violently somersaults onto its back upon ground contact, tearing off its tail, but pilot walks away unscathed. Local news reporters dispatch the story back to Japan where Kashimura gains instant fame as "the pilot who returned on one wing."

• 1937 – (9 &22) Air battles take place between Imperial Japanese Navy and Nationalist Chinese aircraft over Nanchang on December 9 and December 22, during which the Japanese claim the destruction of 29 Chinese aircraft in the air and 25 on the ground.

• 1936 – A KLM Douglas DC-2 crashes on takeoff from Croydon Airport; 15 of 17 on board die.

• 1932 – Wolfgang von Gronau and crew in a Dornier Wal complete the first flight around the world by a seaplane. Their flight takes a mere 111 days.

• 1930 – First airline flight from New York to Panama.

• 1925 – The 111th Observation Squadron, Texas National Guard, suffers its first casualties when Capt. Emil Wagner and Lt. Luke McLaughlin put a Curtiss JN-6H, 38105, into a steep dive whereupon the port wing collapses and the airframe plummets to the ground at Ellington Field, Texas. Both crew survive the impact but die later in a Houston hospital.

• 1909 – American Dr. Henry W. Walden makes the first flight with his triplane known as the Walden III. It is powered by a three-cylinder, 22-HP Anzani engine and takes off from Mineola, Long Island, N. Y.

• 1904 – The Wright brothers discontinued trials with Flyer II after completing 105 tests and 80 brief flights since they began flying the new machine in May. Wilbur Wright flies for five minutes, four seconds over Huffman Prairie, Ohio, flying just under 3 miles.

December 10

• 2011 – Beechcraft 65-80 Queen Air crash occurred when a Beechcraft 65-80 Queen Air cargo plane crashed into the Felixberto Serrano Elementary School near Manila, the capital city of the Philippines, killing at least 14 people including the three crew members on board the aircraft, and injuring over 20 people. Approximately 50 houses in the residential area were set ablaze by the subsequent fire caused by the plane crash. The cause of the crash, as well as the identities of the victims is still unknown.

• 2011 – A gun battle between Libya's new Libyan National Army and a powerful militia force takes place at Tripoli International AirportinTripoli.^[1]

• 2006 – A Bell 412SPair ambulance helicopter crashed near Cajon Pass, killing the three member crew.

• 2005 – Sosoliso Airlines Flight 1145, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9 with 110 people on board, crashes during landing in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. One hundred and seven people die.

• 2004 – Two CT-114 Tutors from Canada's Snowbirds aerobatic team collide at the top of a loop during practice while training near Mossbank, Saskatchewan over Mossbank Airfield. Captain Miles Selby, pilot of '8' was killed instantly, but Captain Chuck Mallet was thrown clear of the wreckage of '9', released his lap belt and pulled his chute release, landing with minor injuries.

• 2004 – The United States Federal Aviation Administration issues an Emergency Airworthiness Directive effectively grounding the entire U. S. fleet of Beechcraft T-34 Mentor aircraft. The AD is in response to fatal in-flight structural failure accidents during simulated aerial combat flights.

• 1999 – A United States Air Force Lockheed C-130E Hercules, 63-7854, of 61st Airlift Squadron, 463d Airlift Group, crashes during landing at Ahmed Al Jaber air base, Kuwait City, Kuwait, killing three of the 94 people on board. Investigation report, released 31 March 2000, blamed crew complacency and failure to follow governing directives during approach to the runway, failing to monitor instruments, a critical function for night flying in reduced visibility.[401]

• 1998 – Captain Michael VandenBos of the Snowbirds aerobatic team dies in a midair collision between two CT-114 Tutors during training near Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.

• 1976 – Wings release triple album “Wings Across America”. (it’s a slow history day)

• 1974 – Helios 1 is launched by the US and Germany, later to make the closest flyby of the Sun.

• 1973 – RAF English Electric Lightning F.3, XP738, 'E', of 111 Squadron, is written off when the undercarriage collapses upon landing at RAF Wattisham, Suffolk. Stripped for spares and consigned to the dump there.

• 1971 – President Richard M. Nixon warns North Vietnam that American bombing of North Vietnam would resume if North Vietnamese military action against South Vietnam increases as American forces are withdrawn from Vietnam.

• 1967 – Singer Otis Redding and four members of his back-up band, The Bar-Kays, are among six people killed in the crash of a Beechcraft 18 into Lake Monona in Madison, Wisconsin.

• 1963 – The United States Air Force’s X-20 Dyna-Soar spaceplane program is cancelled by Robert McNamara.

• 1963 – Test pilot Charles Chuck Yeager, out of Edwards AFB, California, zoom climbs Lockheed NF-104A Starfighter, 56-0762, modified with rocket engine in tail unit, to 106,300 feet (32,400 m), but aircraft enters flat spin when directional jets in nose run out of propellant, forcing him to eject. He suffers injuries when his helmet collides with the ejection seat. This mission was very loosely depicted in the film The Right Stuff. Aircraft was originally built as Lockheed F-104A-10-LO. See also flying accident during a test flight.

• 1958 – National Airlines operates the very first domestic jet service in the United States, flying a Boeing 707 from Miami to New York’s Idlewild (now JFK).

• 1957 – First flight of the Aermacchi MB-326

• 1955 – First flight of the Ryan X-13 Vertijet.

• 1946 – A Curtiss R5C-1 Commando military transport plane, BuNo 39528, c/n 26715/CU355, (ex-USAAF 42-3582), of VMR-152, crashed into Mount Rainier's South Tahoma Glacier, killing 32 U.S. Marines. Wreckage not found until July 1947

• 1943 – Triple night kill by RCAF F/O R. D. Schultz flying in the 410 Squadrons Mosquito, against Do 217 s.

• 1943 – The Allied airstrip at Cape Torokina on Bougainville officially opens.

• 1941 – An SBD Dauntless dive bomber from the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CV-6) piloted by Lieutenant Clarence E. Dickinson sinks the Japanese submarine I-70 northeast of Oahu. I-70 is the first Japanese submarine ever sunk by enemy forces and the first enemy warship sunk by the U. S. armed forces during World War II.

• 1941 – After a courageous attack against Japanese ships off the Philippines, U. S. Army Air Force Captain Colin Kelly, a B-17 C Flying Fortress pilot, becomes one of the earliest American heroes of World War II when he stays at the controls of his stricken bomber long enough for his crew to escape and is killed when his plane explodes. He is mistakenly reported to have deliberately crashed his stricken plane into the Japanese battleship Haruna.

• 1941 – In the Philippines, 54 Japanese naval bombers systematically destroy Cavite Navy Yard and a significant part of neighboring Cavite with precision bombing from 20,000 feet (6,096 m) during a two-hour attack. The submarine USS Sealion (SS-195) is sunk pierside at the Navy Yard, the first American submarine ever sunk by enemy action.

• 1941 – French Indochina-based Imperial Japanese Navy Mitsubishi G3 M bombers (Allied reporting name “Nell”) sink the Royal Navy battleship Prince of Wales and battlecruiser Repulse in the South China Sea east of Malaya using torpedoes. They are the first capital ships to be sunk at sea by aircraft alone.

• 1939 – Second production Sud-Est LeO H-470 flying boat written off when pilot alighted in error in shallow water on Lake Urbino, Corsica, airframe too badly damaged to permit repairs.

• 1938 – First flight of the Lockheed Hudson

• 1935 – A SABENA Savoia-Marchetti S.73 crashes near Tatsfield, Surrey due to pilot error, killing all 11 on board.

• 1928 – First airmail flight between Edmonton and Winnipeg. A WWI pilot, fittingly named Punch Dickens, flew the Fokker Super Universal aircraft for Western Canada Airways. He landed in what is now the Edmonton City Centre Airport carrying mail from Winnipeg, Regina, Saskatoon and North Battleford. Postage for regular mail on that first flight cost five cents.

• 1926 – Western Canada Airways was incorporated, with headquarters in Winnipeg.

• 1919 – First England to Australia flight, by Keith Macpherson Smith and Ross Macpherson Smith, (plus mechanics Sergeant W. H. (Wally) Shiers and J. M. (Jim) Bennett) completed the journey from Hounslow Heath Aerodrome to Darwin in a Vickers Vimy. A distance of 11,340 miles (18,250 km)., after flying 135 hr. 55 min. at an average speed of 83 miles per hour (134 km/h).

• 1914 – HMS Ark Royal is completed. She is the first ship with an internal hangar enclosed by her hull, and the first with specially designed internal spaces to accommodate aviation fuel, lubricants, ordnance, and spares and machinery required for aircraft maintenance.

December 11

• 2009 – First flight of the Airbus A400M Atlas

• 2006 – CH-53E Super Stallion 164785 from HMH-465 carrying 21 personnel crashes in Al Anbar Province. The helicopter experienced a brownout killing 1 and injuring 17.^[1] Helicopter was written off.^[2]

• 2003 – AH-64D Apache from 1–101st Aviation Regiment crash-lands due to the APU clutch failing and starting a fire in flight and subsequently is burned to the ground 15 miles (24 km) south of Mosul. The pilots survived.^[3]

• 2000 – The 18th Bell-Boeing MV-22B Osprey, BuNo 165440, of VMMT-204, with only 157.7 flight hours, crashes in a remote wooded area ~10 miles from MCAS New River, Jacksonville, North Carolina, USA, after a leak in a chafed hydraulic line causes an engine to fail and a glitch in the flight control software prevents the pilots from maintaining control of the aircraft; all 4 crew members are killed.

• 1999 – A SATA International British Aerospace APT crashes on São Jorge Island in the Azores. All 35 people on board die.

• 1998 – Thai Airways International Flight 261, an Airbus A310, crashes during poor weather near Surat Thani, Thailand. Of the 146 people on board, 102 are killed

• 1994 – A bomb explodes on board Philippine Airlines Flight 434, a Boeing 747, killing one passenger, in a prelude to the terrorist Bojinka plot. Despite subsequent difficulties in controlling the aircraft, the crew succeeds in making an emergency landing at Naha, Okinawa.

• 1986 – First flight of the McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle

• 1981 – Spacelab 1 arrives at the Kennedy Space Center.

• 1981 – First flight of the OMAC Laser 300

• 1978 – 6 masked men bind 10 employees at Lufthansa cargo area at John F. Kennedy International Airport, escaping with US$5.8 million in cash & jewellery.

• 1969 – In the Korean Air Lines YS-11 hijacking, a NAMC YS-11 with 54 on board is hijacked by a North Korean agent and is diverted to North Korea; thirty-nine of the passengers were released in early 1970, but the seven remaining passengers, the crew, and the aircraft (which is written off) are never returned.

• 1961 – The first American military aircraft are based in Vietnam, as the U. S. Army’s 8th and 57th Transportation Companies (Light Helicopter), arrive at Saigon, South Vietnam. They are equipped with 32 H-21 C Shawnee transport helicopters.

• 1953 – A USAF Convair B-36D Peacemaker, 44-92071, upgraded from a B-36B-5-CF, crashed into the Franklin Mountains in El Paso, Texas, at 14:37 MST (2137 GMT), during conditions of light snow and low ceilings. The crash report points to pilot error as the primary cause, but confusing instructions from GCA might also have contributed. All eight of the crew were killed: Lt. Col. Herman Gerick, Aircraft Commander; Major George C. Morford, Pilot; Major Douglas P. Miner, Navigator; 1st Lt. Cary B. Fant, Flight Engineer; M Sgt Royal Freeman, Radio Operator; A/1c Edwin D. Howe, Gunner; A/2c Frank Silvestri, Gunner; 1st Lt James M. Harvey, Jr., 492nd Bomb Squadron Staff Flight Engineer. Also killed was a passenger 1st Sgt Dewey Taliaferro.

• 1949 – North American F-51D-25-NT Mustang, 45-11353, of the 192d Fighter Squadron, Nevada Air National Guard, crashes at Reno Air Force Base, Nevada, during a mock dogfight killing Reno native 1st Lt. Croston K. Stead (19 March 1922 - 11 December 1949)[206] during training mission. Base is subsequently named Stead Air Force Base in January 1951 in his honor

• 1944 – The sole Grumman XF5F-1 Skyrocket, BuNo 1442, is written off after a gear-up landing, this date.

• 1941 – American John Gillespie Magee, Jr., serving with newly formed 412 (Fighter) Squadron, RCAF, activated at RAF Digby, England, on 30 June 1941, is killed at the age of 19 whilst flying Supermarine Spitfire, AD291, 'VZ-H', in a mid-air collision with an Airspeed Oxford trainer from RAF Cranwell, flown by Leading Aircraftman Ernest Aubrey. The aircraft collided in cloud cover at about 400 feet (120 m) AGL, at 1130 hrs. over the village of Roxholm which lies between RAF Cranwell and RAF Digby, in Lincolnshire. Magee was descending at the time. At the inquiry afterwards a farmer testified that he saw the Spitfire pilot struggling to push back the canopy. The pilot stood up to jump from the plane but was too close to the ground for his parachute to open, and died on impact. Magee is buried at Holy Cross, Scopwick Cemetery in Lincolnshire, England.

• 1941 – The first landing attemptbyJapanese pilots is made in their attempted attack on Wake Island in the Battle of Wake Island; it is to become the only failed World War II landing.

• 1941 – U. S. Navy PBY Catalina flying boats arrive in Natal, Brazil, to begin patrols of the Brazilian coast and the South Atlantic Ocean.

• 1941 – Four United States Marine Corps Grumman F4F Wildcat fighters on Wake Island play an important role in repelling a Japanese invasion of the island.

• 1941 – The United States exchanges declarations of war with Germany and Italy.

• 1937 – Consolidated PB-2A, 35-50, of Headquarters Squadron, 8th Pursuit Group, crashes at Langley Field, Virginia, killing Army Air Corps Major Alfred J. Waller, a distinguished World War I combat pilot. Waller Army Airfield, activated in Trinidad on 1 September 1941, (later Waller Air Force Base), is named in his honor.

• 1917 – Katherine Stinson flies 606 miles from San Diego to San Francisco, setting a new American non-stop distance record.

• 1913 – First flight of the Sikorsky Ilya Muromets.

December 12

• 1994 – Stuart Roosa, American astronaut, died (b. 1933). Roosa was a NASA astronaut, who was the command module pilot for the Apollo 14 mission. Throughout his career, Roosa logged more than 5,500 hours of flying time (5,000 hours in jets) and 217 hours in space.

• 1989 – ‘Canadian Aviation’ (Maclean Hunter Ltd, ISSN 0008-2953) Monthly general interest magazine published from June 1928 until the merger with ‘Aerospace & Defence Technology’ to form ‘Aviation & Aerospace’ (see above). Included the long running Ace McCool humorous series of articles. Last issue was Vol.62 No.12 December 1989. Published by the Aviation League of Canada 1928-1931; by the Canadian Flying Clubs Association, 1932-1936; by Aeronautical Publications, 1937-September 1939; by Maclean-Hunter, October 1939-December 1989. Titled Canadian Aviation Magazine 1945-1950+. 52 pages in each issue in the 1950s. Ceased publication.

• 1988 – First flight of the CMC Leopard G-BKRL

• 1985 – Arrow Air Flight 1285, a chartered Douglas DC-8-63CF, N950JW, crashes just after take-off from Gander, Newfoundland, Canada, killing 256 people, of whom 248 were soldiers in the United States Army 101st Airborne Division returning from overseas duty in the Sinai desert, Egypt. This remains the greatest peacetime loss of military personnel in US history.

• 1981 – Maxie Anderson and Don Ida launch from Luxor, Egypt, in the balloon Jules Verne to begin the first serious attempt at a circumnavigation of the world by balloon. They are forced to end their attempt on December 14 at Hansa, India, after a flight of 4,316 km (2,682 mi).

• 1979 – First flight of the Sikorsky SH-60 Seahawk.

• 1979 – USAF General Dynamics F-111E-CF, 68-0045, c/n A1-63, of the 79th TFS, 20th TFW, based at RAF Upper Heyford, crashed in the sea off Wainfleet Range, UK, during night bombing practice, range staff witnessing it dive into the water before the crew could eject. Pilot Capt. R.P. Gaspard and Maj. F.B. Slusher KWF. Gale force conditions prevented discovery of any wreckage for two days.

• 1968 – Pan Am Flight 217, a Boeing 707, crashes near Caracas, Venezuela as a result of pilot error; all 51 on board died.

• 1961 – Mid-air collision of two BAF Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar at Chièvres Air Base, Belgium. 15 died.

• 1957 – Major Adrian Drew sets a new world speed record, in a modified F-101 Voodoo, of 1,943 km (1,207 mi).

• 1957 – A U.S. Air Force Boeing B-52D-75-BO Stratofortress, 56-0597, crashes on takeoff at Fairchild AFB near Spokane, Washington. All crew members are killed except the tail gunner. The incident is caused by trim motors that were hooked up backwards. The aircraft climbed straight up, stalled, fell over backwards and nosed straight down. Among the dead crewmen was the commanding officer of the SAC bomb wing to which the aircraft was assigned. Wreckage was strewn over a radius of more than 1,000 feet (300 m) in a stubble field about a mile west of the airbase. Although the Air Force has never indicated whether or not nuclear weapons were aboard the aircraft, this crash was cited in a February 1991 EPA report as having involved nuclear materials.

• 1953 – Mach 2.5 (2 ½ times the speed of sound) is achieved for the first time by Major Charles “Chuck” Yeager in the Bell X-1 A. The rocket-propelled experimental aircraft reaches 1,650 mph (2,660 km/h) at 70,000 ft (21,000 m).

• 1951 – First flight of the de Havilland Canada DHC-3 Otter prototype CF-DYK-X

• 1951 – Alaska Air becomes the first airline to fly over the North Pole

• 1946 – First flight of the Westland Wyvern TS371 took place on 16 Dec 1946.^[1]

• 1941 – Major General Herbert A. Dargue, the first recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross, en route to Hawaii to assume command of the Hawaiian Department from Lieutenant General Walter Short, is killed when his Douglas B-18 Bolo, 36-306, of the 31st Air Base Group, crashes in the Sierra Mountains, S of Bishop, California, in worsening weather conditions. Wreckage not found until March 1942. (Joe Baugher cites discovery date of 5 July 1942.) Besides the general, seven are KWF including his staff, and crew chiefs, critically needed in the Pacific.

• 1941 – World War II: USMC F4 F “Wildcats” sink the first 4 major Japanese ships off Wake Island.

• 1941 – World War II: Fifty four Japanese A6 M Zero fighters raid Batangas Field, Philippines. Jesus Villamor and four Filipino fighter pilots fend them off; Cesar Basa is killed.

• 1940 – The British aircraft carriers HMS Eagle and HMS Illustrious strike Italian transport at Bardia, Libya. Later in the month their aircraft strike Rhodes and Stampalia in Greece and Tripoli in Libya.

• 1939 – Introduction: Blackburn Botha

• 1938 – First flight of the Fairey Albacore prototype L7074

• 1937 – The USS Panay incident occurs, when Imperial Japanese Navy Yokosuka B4Y (Allied reporting name “Jean”) bombers and Nakajima A4 N fighters sink the U. S. Navy gunboat USS Panay (PR-5) and three nearby Standard Oil tankers on the Yangtze River near Nanking.

• 1934 – Fokker YO-27, 31-588, of the 12th Observation Squadron, Brooks Field, Texas, belly-lands at Brooks this date. Airframe surveyed and dropped from inventory, 7 March 1935, total flight time 296 hours.

• 1928 – Royal Air Force Vickers Victorias evacuate British civilians from Kabul.

• 1927 – First flight of the Nakajima A1N

• 1924 – The Cierva C.6 autogyro makes the first cross-country flight by a rotary-wing aircraft, piloted by Captain Joaquín Loriga Taboada the 10.5 km (7 statute miles) from Cuatro Vientos airfield to Getafe, Spain, in eight minutes.

• 1918 – Cpt R. M. Smith, Brig Gen A. E. Borton and Maj Gen W. Salmond set out in a Handley Page O/400 from HeliopolistoKarachi, to survey a route for airmail to India.

• 1917 – North Sea class blimp N.S.5 sets off for RNAS East Fortune, but both engines fail within sight of her destination, and she drifts with the wind for about 10 miles (16 km) before they can be restarted. However, since both engines continue to be troublesome it is decided to make a "free balloon" landing, but the ship is damaged beyond repair during the attempt.

• 1916 – Sole prototype of Kishi No.2 Tsurugi-go ("Sword" type) Aeroplane, 'II', single-engine pusher biplane, makes first and last flight when Lt. Inoue lifts off, immediately banks sharply to port, wingtip contacts ground, airframe cartwheels sustaining considerable damage. Cause of accident assumed to be due to the sweptback wing design.

• 1915 – German Leutnant Theodor Mallinckrodt makes the initial “hop” of the world’s first practical all-metal aircraft, the Junkers J 1.

December 13

• 2012 – The Japan Air Self-Defense Force scrambles four Mitsubishi F-15 fighters to intercept a People's Republic of China Harbin Y-12 seen flying over the Senkaku Islands (known as Diaoyu in Chinese), which both countries claim as their territory. The Y-12 departs before the F-15s arrive over the islands.^[1]

• 2011 – The engine of an unarmed, contractor-operated U.S. Air Force MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle fails two minutes after takeoff from Seychelles International Airport on Mahé in the Seychelles. The Reaper descends too quickly while its operator attempts an emergency landing at the airport, touches down too far along the runway, bounces over a perimeter road and breakwater, and crashes and sinks in the Indian Ocean about 200 feet (61 meters) offshore.^[2]

• 1995 – Banat Air Flight 166, a Romavia Antonov An-24 (registered YR-AMR), crashes after taking off from Verona airport, because of overloading and ice accumulation on the wings. All 4 crew and all 45 passengers die.

• 1994 – American Eagle Flight 3379, a Jetstream 31, crashed 5 miles short of the runway in Raleigh-Durham, killing 15 of the 20 on board. The night flight crashed due to an engine failure and not following the proper procedures after it.

• 1993 – Lockheed U-2R, 68-10339, Article 061, eleventh airframe of initial R-model order of twelve, N819X allocated, delivered to USAF 22 October 1968, but retained for trials. Delivered to 100th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing by early 1972. To 9th SRW, 1976. On take-off, this date, from Beale AFB, California, jet goes out of control, experienced U-2 Instructor Pilot Capt. Richard Schneider ejects but does not survive.

• 1987 – Philippine Airlines Flight 443, a Shorts 360-300, crashes into Mt. Gurain on the island of Mindanao. All 15 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 1977 – University of Evansville men’s basketball team plane crash occurred when a DC-3 aircraft chartered from the Indianapolis-based National Jet crashed on takeoff at the Evansville Regional Airport, killing 29, including the University of Evansville basketball team, support staff and boosters of the team.

• 1972 – Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt begin the third and final Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) or “Moonwalk” of Apollo 17. This was the last manned mission to the moon of the 20th century.

• 1971 – The RCAF’s 436 Squadron Hercules was fired on by the Indian Navy over the Bay of Bengal.

• 1968 – USAF Martin B-57E Canberra 54-4284 of the 8th Tactical Bombardment Squadron, 35th Tactical Fighter Wing, has mid-air collision with Fairchild C-123B-5-FA Provider 54-0600 over Xieng Khovang, southern Laos, all three crew of the B-57 KWF, pilot of C-123 survives bail-out, lands in tree, rescued by an HH-3, but six others are KWF.

• 1959 – First flight of the Aviamilano Scricciolo I-MAGY

• 1955 – The de Havilland Comet 3, the world’s first jet airliner, visits an American airport for the first time when it stops at Honolulu International Airport during an around-the-world flight. It then flies to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, in 5 hours 39 min.

• 1951 – Maj George Davis of the 334th Fighter Interceptor Squadron shoots down four MiG-15 s in a single day.

• 1948 – A blade on the starboard rotor of the second prototype Bratukhin B-11 Soviet twin-rotor helicopter fails, and the subsequent crash kills the two crew.

• 1944 – As the U. S. Navy Mindoro Attack Force is about to round the southern cape of Negros to enter the Sulu Sea, a Japanese Aichi D3 A (Allied reporting name “Val”) dive bomber operating as a kamikaze hits the light cruiser USS Nashville (CL-43), flagship for the Mindoro invasion, badly damaging her, wounding ground forces commander Brigadier General William C. Dunckel, and killing and wounding members of his staff. Another kamikaze badly damages a destroyer.

• 1944 – (13–17) Six U. S. Navy escort carriers provide direct support for the U. S. invasion of Mindoro. They fly 864 sorties, losing nine planes, none to enemy action.

• 1943 – North American’s P-51 B Mustangs accompany 651 heavy bombers to U-boat pens at Kiel, Germany. Three days later a Mustang downs a German fighter for the first time.

• 1943 – Since November 14, the Japanese have lost 122 aircraft based in the Marshall Islands.

• 1942 – U. S. Navy PBY Catalina flying boats begin night harassment raids against Munda airfield.

• 1939 – A Fairey Seafox floatplane catapulted from the British light cruiser HMS Ajax spots fire for her guns while she fires on the German “pocket battleship” Admiral Graf Spee during the Battle of the River Plate. It is the first time in World War II that a ship-based seaplane spots gunfire for a Royal Navy ship and is considered a classic example of the use of a floatplane in such a role; the pilot, Lieutenant E. D. G. Lewin, receives the Distinguished Service Cross for the action. The Seafox goes on to conduct reconnaissance flights over the Admiral Graf Spee daily until her crew scuttles her on December 17.

• 1936 – First flight of the PZL.37 Łoś.

• 1935 – A U.S. Army Air Corps officer is killed in the crash of a Boeing P-12F, 32-100, of the 36th Pursuit Squadron, 3 miles E of Dale, South Carolina, while en route from Langley Field, Virginia, to Miami, Florida for an air race and exhibition. Maj. Arthur K. Ladd was the assistant supply officer for the General Headquarters Air Force. Fairbanks Air Base, Fairbanks, Alaska, is renamed Ladd Field on 1 December 1939.

• 1924 – In an early parasite fighter experiment, Lt Clyde Flinter unsuccessfully attempts to dock his Sperry Messenger with the US Army airship TC-3.

• 1918 – Maj A. S. C. MacLaren and Cpt Robert Halley set out on the first England-India flight, in a Handley Page V/1500

• 1913 – 13-14 – German balloonist Hugo Kaulen stays aloft for 87 hours. This record lasted until 1935.

• 1872 – Paul Haenlein tests the first airship with a gas engine in Brünn, achieving 19 km/h. The tests were stopped because of a shortage of money.

December 14

• 2009 – Cabin crew at British Airways vote overwhelmingly in favor of a planned 12 days of strike action over Christmas and the New Year in a dispute over job cuts and changes to staff contracts. On 17 December the High Court rules that Unite, the representing trade union, had not correctly balloted its members on the strike action, meaning that the strikes could not go ahead.

• 1999 – The United States Border Patrol arrests the would-be “Millennium Bomber” Ahmed Ressam for the 2000 millennium attack plots, when he arrives from Canada by ferry at Port Angeles, Washington, with timing devices and 130 pounds (59 kg) of explosives in his car. He had planned to bomb Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles, California, on the upcoming New Year’s Eve.

• 1988 – JAL (Japan Air Lines) announces that they will be the first airline to add personal video screens on their 747-400 s in the first and business class cabins.

• 1986 – (14-23) First non-stop flight around the planet without refueling – The Voyager, piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, on a distance of 40,212 kilometres (24,987 mi).

• 1984 – First flight of the Grumman X-29.

• 1979 – First flight of the Edgley Optica.

• 1977 – First flight of the Mil Mi-26.

• 1972 – Apollo program: Eugene Cernan is the last person to walk on the moon, after he and Harrison Schmitt complete the third and final Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) of Apollo 17. This was the last manned mission to the moon of the 20th century.

• 1967 – As part of a Centennial project, Col. Robert (Bud) White sets a Canadian altitude record by flying a fighter jet to 30,030 metres (98,520 ft) Col. White dives 3,600 metres (11,800 ft) at full throttle to gain speed for his supersonic climb at Mach 2.4.

• 1965 – A Learjet 23 executive transport shows off its impressive capabilities by climbing to 40,000 feet (12,000 m) in 7 min 21 seconds with seven people aboard.

• 1964 – The US Air Force launches Operation Barrel Roll, attacking the Ho Chi Minh trailinLaos.

• 1962 – Mariner 2 becomes the first spacecraft to fly past Venus.

• 1961 – Second prototype Hawker Siddeley P.1127, XP836, crashed at RNAS Yeovilton (HMS Heron) when a 'cold nozzle' is lost in flight. Aircraft becomes uncontrollable on approach to Yeovilton and pilot Bill Bedford ejects at 200 feet (61 m) altitude.

• 1959 – Captain Joe B. Jordan, USAF, set a new world altitude record of 31,513 meters (103,389 feet) in a Lockheed F-104C Starfighter, 56-885. This exceeded the previous record, set just 8 days earlier by Commander Lawrence E. Flint, USN, in a prototype McDonnell YF4H-1 Phantom II, by 4.95%.

• 1959 – Boeing KC-97 Stratotanker, 53-0231, c/n 17113, of the 384th Air Refueling Squadron, out of Westover Air Reserve Base, Massachusetts, collides with a Boeing B-52 Stratofortress during a refueling mission at an altitude of ~15,000 feet (4,600 m). The aircraft loses the whole left horizontal stabilizer and elevator, the rudder, and the upper quarter of the vertical stabilizer. Crew makes a no-flap, electrical power off landing at night at Bangor Air National Guard Base (DOW AFB), Maine, seven crew okay. "Spokesmen at Dow Air Force, Bangor, said the B-52 apparently 'crowded too close' and rammed a fuel boom into the tail of a 4 engined KC95 tanker plane." Aircraft stricken as beyond economical repair. Two crew on the B-52 eject, parachute safely, and are recovered by helicopters in a snow-covered wilderness area. The bomber and remaining eight crew members continue to Westover AFB, where a safe landing is made.

• 1956 – Brazil becomes the first country in Latin America to acquire an aircraft carrier, purchasing HMS Vengeance (R71) from the United Kingdom. In 1960, she will become the second Latin American aircraft carrier to enter service, as Brazilian aircraft carrier Minas Gerais.

• 1953 – First flight of the Miles Sparrowjet.

• 1952 – A Royal Air Force Boeing B-29 Superfortress, WF570, of 35 Squadron, RAF Marham, flies into ground 5 miles (8.0 km) ENE of Marham whilst attempting a radio compass let down in bad weather. Both pilots, the nav/plotter and the radio operato are killed, whilst the flight engineer and one of the air gunners suffer serious injuries.

• 1944 – (14–16) Task Force 38 carrier aircraft attack Japanese airfields on Luzon, employing for the first time the “Big blue blanket” tactic of keeping aircraft over the airfields day and night to prevent Japanese air attacks on the beachhead at Mindoro. Flying 1,671 sorties, they drop 336 tons (304,817 kg) of bombs, claiming 62 Japanese aircraft destroyed in the air and 208 on the ground, for a loss of 27 U. S. aircraft in combat and 38 due to non-combat causes.

• 1944 – First flight of the Short Shetland

• 1943 – Aircraft of the U. S. Army Air Forces’ Fifth Air Force attack Japanese forces at Arawe with 433 tons (392,815 kg) of bombs.

• 1941 – (14-19) Japanese naval aircraft from Kwajalein Atoll strike Wake Island repeatedly.

• 1931 – RAF pilot Douglas Bader (21 February 1910 – 5 September 1982), undertaking a low-level roll in Bristol Bulldog Mk. IIA, K1676, of 23 SquadronatRAF Woodley, Great Britain, hooks a wingtip, rolls the biplane into a ball, and loses both his legs. Undeterred, he returns to the air and becomes a renowned World War II fighter pilot with 22 credited "kills" before being downed over France, 9 August 1941. As a POW, he has such determination to escape that he is eventually sent to Colditz Castle for recidivist escapees.

• 1927 – US aircraft carrier USS Lexington is commissioned.

• 1924 – First flight of the Martin MO, is launched using an explosive-driven catapult fitted to a turret on USS Mississippi, requiring less distance than ever for the take-off.

• 1920 – A 1920 Golders Green Handley Page O/400 crashes on take-off from Handley Page Transport (Cricklewood Aerodrome]), North London, on a scheduled flight from London to Paris. Two crew and two of the six passengers were killed.

• 1916 – Flight Sub Lt. Arthur Ince a RFC Observer shot down a Geman seaplane off the coast of Belgium. This was the first Canadian aerial victory. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.

• 1914 – A Royal Naval Air Service Avro 504 of the No. 203 Squadron RAF (Eastchurch Squadron]) drops four 16 pounds (7.3 kg) bombs on the Ostend-Bruges railway in Belgium.

• 1903 – Wilbur Wright makes the first and unsuccessful attempt at powered flight at Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. His aircraft stalls after 3 ½ seconds in the air and crash-lands 105 feet (32 m) away.

• 1782 – The Montgolfier brothers first balloon lifts on its first test flight.

December 15

• 2012 – Ten Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan members attack Bacha Khan International AirportinPeshawar, Pakistan, with rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons, targeting Pakistani militiary facilities where attack helicopters are based and triggering a gun battle of over an hour with Pakistani security forces during which five of the attackers are killed. Three grenades strike airport property and two more land in adjacent neighborhoods. Four residents of the neighborhoods are killed and 30 to 40 injured. The five surviving attackers all are cornered and killed by Pakistani police the following day.^[1][2]

• 2010 – Last operation by a Harrier Jump Jet, from RAF Cottesmore.

• 2010 – A Tara Air flight operated by DHC-6 Twin Otter 9N-AFX crashed into a mountain shortly after departure from Lamidanda Airport, Nepal. The aircraft was operating a chartered passenger flight to Tribhuvan International Airport, Kathmandu, Nepal. All 19 passengers and crew were killed.^[3]

• 2009 – First flight of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner

• 2006 – First flight of the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II

• 2005 – Introduction: Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor. It reaches an altitude of 15,000 feet (4,600 m) in less than three minutes.

• 1997 – A chartered Tupolev Tu-154 from Tajikistan crashes in the desert near Sharjah (emirate), United Arab Emirates airport killing 85.

• 1996 – The mergerofMcDonnell Douglas and Boeing is announced

• 1989 – KLM Flight 867, a Boeing 747 flying from AmsterdamtoAnchorage, Alaska, flies through a cloud of volcanic debris, subsequently losing power from all four engines. The crew is able to restart the engines and land the plane safely.

• 1978 – Retired: Fairey Gannet

• 1970 – Artem Mikoyan, founder of the dynasty of MiG fighters, dies at age 65.

• 1970 – U.S. Navy Grumman C-2 Greyhound, BuNo 155120, of VRC-50, crashes on takeoff from USS Ranger, in the Gulf of Tonkin. Stalled after catapult launch with a probable load shift of the cargo, reaches extreme nose-up attitude, goes into a hammerhead stall, and crashes off the carrier's port bow, 9 killed, 7 missing. Footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlDmMwI9cik

• 1970 – RAF English Electric Canberra, XM267, 'E', of No 3(F) Sq­ron, crashed at RAF Akrotiri, Cyprus, while on detachment from Sq­ron base at RAF Laarbruch, Germany. On approach to Akrotiri runway pilot elected to carry out an over shoot. When both engines were throttled up the starboard engine responded and increased power; port engine failed to respond. The effect of this was the aircraft 'cartwheeled' and port wing hit the ground killing both crew and passenger. Pilot F/O R. Ellis, Navigator F/O R MacMillan, one passenger Senior Aircraftman Kim Petty-Fitzmaurice.

• 1965 – Gemini program: Gemini 6A, crewed by Wally Schirra and Thomas P. Stafford, is launched from Cape Canaveral. Four orbits later, it achieved the first space rendezvous with Gemini 7.

• 1959 – Maj J W Roberts sets a new airspeed record of 1,526 miles per hour (2,456 km/h) in a F-106 Delta Dart

• 1955 – The de Havilland Mosquito flies its final operational sortie with the Royal Air Force

• 1954 – Orenda Iroquois jet engine, designed for the Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow, made its first test run.

• 1951 – No. 421 Sq­ron returned after training in England and was relocated at St. Hubert, Quebec. They were re-equipped with North American F-86 Sabre fighters.

• 1951 – Introduction: Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation

• 1948 – First flight of the Northrop X-4 Bantam

• 1948 – No. 2401 Radar Sq­ron (Auxiliary) – Later designated Aircraft Control and Warning Sq­ron – was formed at Montreal.

• 1944 – Noorduyn Norseman, 44-70285, c/n 550, disappears over the English Channel with Maj. Glenn Miller, pilot John Morgan and Lt. Col. Norman Baessell on board after departing RAF Twinwood Farm, Clapham, Bedfordshire, England. Missing Air Crew Report (MACR) 10770. It is believed that the plane was lost by straying into a forbidden zone in mid-channel which was designated for the jettisoning of surplus ordnance. On that day, a sq­ron of RAF Avro Lancasters had aborted a mission and were salvoing their bombloads in this zone. One crewman, a navigator, claims to have looked down and seen a Norseman flying low over the water. Before he could draw any attention to this, the Norseman was apparently overwhelmed by bomb splashes and disappeared. Other conspiracy theories about the disappearance have also been advanced.

• 1944 – U. S. forces land on Mindoro. Over the next 30 days, there will be 334 alerts of Japanese air attack on the beachhead. Kamikaze attacks begin immediately, and persist until January 4, 1945.

• 1943 – Boeing FortressBoeing Fortress of No. 168 (HT) Squadron, piloted by W/C RB Middleton, left Rockcliffe, Ontario with mail for Canadian servicemen overseas. This began RCAF air transport operations on a global scale.

• 1943 – (15-25) Japanese aircraft at Rabaul bomb U. S. forces on Bougainville nightly, killing 38 and wounding 136.

• 1943 – Fifth Air Force aircraft cover U. S. Army landings at Arawe. A strike on the landing forces by 64 Japanese naval aircraft is unsuccessful.

• 1941 – The RCAF No. 419(B) Squadron formed with Wellington IC aircraft.

• 1939 – First flight of the SNCASE Languedoc

• 1937 – A Spanish Republican offensive in the area of Teruel, Spain, begins. The ensuing Battle of Teruel will last until February 22, 1938, and involve 120 fighters, 80 bombers, and 100 other aircraft on the Republican side and 150 fighters, 100 bombers, and 110 other aircraft on the Nationalist side.

• 1920 – The first of a number of flying schools to train reserve pilots for the military opens at Orly, south of Paris.

• 1919 – First flight of the Swiss airline Ad Astra Aero S. A. was founded in Zurich.

• 1916 – First flight of the Anatra D.

December 16

• 2009 – Scotland’s largest airline Flyglobespan enters administration and ceases all flights.

• 2009 – Pakistan Air Force Dassault Mirage III fighter aircraft crashed during a training mission due to a technical fault. The pilot managed to eject safely, landing in the Durrab Lake, (Kallar Kahar) and was rescued by a boat.

• 2006 – A Mexican Air Force Antonov An-32, 3103, of 3 Grupo Aero/EATP 301, crashes into the sea off the coast of Mexico, near Acapulco. The four crew members on board are killed.

• 1997 – Air Canada Flight 646, a Bombardier CRJ200, crashes after a failed go-around attempt in Fredericton, New Brunswick. All passengers and crew survive.

• 1994 – First flight of the Antonov An-70.

• 1985 – McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle, 84-0042, of the 3246th Test Wing, Armament Development and Test Center, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, crashes in the Gulf of Mexico, 53 miles SE of Eglin. The Armament Division commander, Col. Timothy F. O'Keefe, Jr., and Maj. Eugene F. Arnold, an instructor pilot with the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin, eject safely.

• 1982 – A United States Air Force Boeing B-52 Stratofortress crashed after take-off from Mather Air Force Base, nine killed.

• 1980 – Douglas Campbell (aviator), American pilot dies (b. 1896). Campbell was an American aviator and World War I flying ace. He was the first American aviator flying in an American unit to achieve the status of ace.

• 1979 – The British Airways Concorde lands in London after flying from New York in less than three hours (2 hours 58 min) at an average speed of 1,172 miles per hour (1,886 km/h).

• 1969 – U.S. Navy Vought F-8 Crusader, BuNo 145611, of Detachment 19, VFP-63, crashes into the Gulf of Tonkin ~60 miles (97 km) E of Đồng Hới, killing pilot Lt. Victor Patrick Buckley, of Falls Church, Virginia, while returning to the USS Hancock from a photographic reconnaissance mission. Cause of loss thought to be accidental.

• 1960 – The 1960 New York air disaster: United Airlines Flight 826, a Douglas DC-8, and TWA Flight 266, a Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation, collide in mid-air over Staten Island in New York; all 128 aboard the two planes and six people on the ground are killed. This was the first crash in which a flight recorder was used to provide details in a crash investigation.

• 1958 – Convair B-58 Hustler, 58-1008, c/n 15, accepted and delivered to the 6592nd Test Squadron, 43rd Bomb Wing, for pod and suitability testing during October: 1958. Crashed this date, the first Convair B-58 Hustler accident, 70 kilometres (43 mi) NNE of Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico, due to loss of control during normal flight when auto trim and ratio changer were rendered inoperative due to an electrical system failure. Air Force pilot Maj. Richard Smith killed; AF Nav/bombardier Lt. Col. George Gradel, AF DSO Capt. Daniel Holland, both survive.

• 1957 – First flight of the Antonov An-12.

• 1955 – Republic F-105 Thunderchief, 54-0098, the first prototype, crash lands at Edwards Air Force Base, California. Republic test pilot Russell M. "Rusty" Roth was forced to make an emergency landing after the right main landing gear had been torn away after having been inadvertently extended during high speed flight. Pilot uninjured. Although the airframe was returned to the factory, it was deemed too costly to repair.

• 1948 – The Royal Australian Navy commissions its first aircraft carrier, HMAS Sydney (R17).

• 1945 – Second of two prototypes of the Douglas XB-42 Mixmaster, 43-50225, on routine flight out of Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, Washington, D.C., suffers in short order, a landing gear extension problem, failure of the port engine, and as coolant temperatures rose, failure of starboard engine. Maj. Hayduck bails out at 1,200 feet (370 m), Lt. Col. Haney at 800 feet (240 m), and pilot Lt. Col. (later Major General) Fred J. Ascani, after crawling aft to jettison pusher propellers, at 400 feet (120 m) - all three survive. Aircraft impacts at Oxen Hill, Maryland. Secret jettison-able props caused a problem for authorities in explaining what witnesses on ground thought was the aircraft exploding. Possible fuel management problem speculated, but no proof.

• 1943 – (16-17) – Almost continuous unopposed Japanese air attacks on the landing force at Arawe damage and destroy various U. S. landing craft and small craft.

• 1940 – (Overnight) For the first time, Royal Air Force Bomber Command conducts a raid focusing on attacking a city center rather than specific targets in Operation Rachel, a raid by 134 British bombers against Mannheim, Germany, in reprisal for the German raid on Coventry in November. Their bombs are dispersed widely, killing 34 people in Mannheim and Ludwigshafen.

• 1932 – During a routine practice flight, Capt. J. L. Grisham flying Fokker Y1O-27, 31-599, '2', of the 30th Bombardment Squadron, is unable to get the port main undercarriage leg to extend more than one-quarter down, makes emergency landing in San Diego Bay off of NAS San Diego, California. He and Sgt. Clarence J. King survive, aircraft salvaged, repaired and returned to service.

• 1929 – First flight of the R100

• 1929 – Tydeo Larre Borges is the first South American pilot to cross the South Atlantic Ocean.

• 1921 – USS Wright (AV-1) is commissioned as the United States Navy’s first and only balloon ship. She is the only U. S. Navy ship ever to bear the “AZ” designation for “lighter-than-air craft tender. ”

• 1919 – Construction of the Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Japanese aircraft carrier Hōshō begins. She is the second aircraft carrier in the world designed and built as such to be laid down, and will be the first to be completed.

• 1914 – SMS Glyndwr is the first Imperial German Navy aviation ship to be commissioned. She serves initially as a seaplane pilot training ship.

December 17

• 2009 – First flight of the Eurocopter EC175

• 2004 – First flight of the Antonov An-148

• 2003 – The 100th anniversary of the first flight of the Wright Brothers in the Wright Flyer is celebrated as the 100th birthday of aviation.

• 2003 – Scaled Composites SpaceShipOne suffered a collapsed landing gear and a runway excursion during a freefall flight prior to its space launches.

• 1997 – Aerosvit Flight 241, a Yakovlev Yak-42, crashes near Thessaloniki, Greece, killing all 70 occupants – 8 crew and 62 passengers.

• 1994 – KLM’s last DC-10 is retired.

• 1994 – The C-5 Galaxy sets a national record after taking off with the maximum payload of 920,836 pounds (417,684 kg), setting a U. S. national record.

• 1981 – First flight of the NAC Fieldmaster

• 1977 – United Airlines Flight 2860, a Douglas DC-8, Jet Trader, crashes in the Wasatch Range in Utah, killing the 3 crew on board.

• 1974 – First flight of the McDonnell Douglas DC-9-50

• 1973 – Pan Am Flight 110, a Boeing 707, is firebombed by Palestinian gunmen while at gate in Rome, Italy, killing 29 of 68 passengers and crew; other gunmen then hijack a Lufthansa Boeing 737 to Athens; in total, 33 die as a result of the firebombing and hijacking.

• 1971 – The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 comes to an end. The Indian Air Force has lost 72 aircraft and the Pakistani Air Force 94 aircraft.

• 1969 – The USAF closes Project Blue Book, its 22-year investigation into sightings of unidentified flying objects, or UFOs.

• 1963 – First flight of the Lockheed C-141 Starlifter

• 1963 – First flight of the Moynet Jupiter

• 1960 – 1960 Munich Convair 340 crash: A U. S. Air Force Convair C-131D Samaritan crashes due to fuel contamination shortly after takeoff from Munich-Riem Airport in Munich, West Germany. It crashes in the Ludwigsvorstadt borough of downtown Munich, striking a crowded two-section Munich streetcar. All 20 people on the plane and 32 people on the ground die.

• 1960 – The visitor’s center at the Wright Brothers National Memorial in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, is dedicated on the 57th anniversary of the Wright Flyer‘s first flight in 1903.

• 1956 – First flight of the Grumman E-1 Tracer

• 1954 – The 1,000th Wichita-built Boeing B-47 Stratojet is delivered to the Strategic Air Command.

• 1954 – President Dwight D. Eisenhower presents James H. “Dutch” Kindleberger and the North American Aviation North American F-100 Super Sabre design team with the Collier Trophy in recognition of their contributions to aviation.

• 1953 – A USAF Boeing B-29 Superfortress, 44-87741, built as a B-29-90-BW, making an emergency landing at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, failed to reach the runway and crashed into an officers housing area at the base, demolishing ten homes and damaging three more. Nine of sixteen crew were killed, as were seven on the ground – an officer, his wife, and five children.

• 1950 – The F-86 Sabre begins operations in Korea

• 1947 – First flight of the Boeing B-47 Stratojet

• 1944 – U. S. Army Air Forces Major Richard Bong scores his 40th and final aerial victory, enough to make him the top-scoring American ace of World War II. He has made all of his kills flying the Lockheed P-38 Lightning.

• 1943 – For the first time, the Cape Torokina airstrip on Bougainville is used to stage the first Air Solomons (AirSols) raid on Rabaul.

• 1942 – A U. S. Army Air Forces reconnaissance and bombing raid on Amchitka in the Aluetian Islands destroys every building in the deserted Aleut village there, although no Japanese are on the island.

• 1941 – (17-20) All surviving Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers of the United States Army Air Force‘s Far East Air Force are withdrawn from the Philippine Islands to Australia. All other Far Eastern Air Force aircraft are destroyed or captured by the Japanese.

• 1941 – A Yokosuka E14Y floatplane (Allied reporting name “Glen”) launched by the Japanese submarine I-7 conducts a post-strike reconnaissance flight over Pearl Harbor. It is the E14Y’s combat debut.

• 1941 – Aircraft from HMS Audacity (D10) damage the German submarine U-131 so badly that her crew later scuttles her. It is the first time that escort aircraft carrier-based aircraft contribute to the sinking of a submarine.

• 1941 – In the Philippine Islands, United States Army Air Forces Curtiss P-40 Warhawk pilot Lieutenant Colonel Boyd Wagner shoots down his fifth Japanese plane near Vigan, becoming the first American ace of World War II.

• 1939 – UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand sign an agreement at Ottawa to set up the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan in Canada for the training of aircrew. The Plan was to be administered and organized by the RCAF.

• 1935 – The Douglas DC-3, one of the most successful airliners of all time, makes its first flight

• 1916 – First flight of the Handley Page Type O

• 1903 – The Wright Brothers make four flights in their FlyeratKitty Hawk, North Carolina. After years of dedicated research and development, the brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright fly 120 feet (37 m)) in the first practical aeroplane. This may be the first controlled powered heavier-than-air flight and the first photographed powered heavier-than-air flight. On their fourth flight they manage 850 feet (260 m).

December 18

• 2006 – The Lockheed Martin Polecat UAV aircraft crashes due to an "irreversible unintentional failure in the flight termination ground equipment, which caused the aircraft's automatic fail-safe flight termination mode to activate", cited by Lockheed Martin.

• 2003 – FedEx Express Flight 647, a McDonnell Douglas MD-10-10, veers off the runway upon landing after a landing gear collapse and catches fire at Memphis International Airport; two crew members and five passengers escape with only minor injuries.

• 2003 – First flight of the ShinMaywa US-2

• 1995 – The Trans Service Airlift Lockheed L-188 crash after taking off overloaded from Jamba, Angola, kills 141 of the 144 people on board.

• 1977 – SA de Transport Aérien Flight 730, a Sud Aviation SE-210 Caravelle 10R, crashes into the sea while on final approach to Madeira Airport, killing 36 people.

• 1992 – First flight of the MD Helicopters MD Explorer

• 1986 – The ill-fated Nimrod Airborne Early Warning project was finally cancelled after numerous delays and setbacks. In its place, 6 (later changed to 7) Boeing E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft was ordered.

• 1982 – Hans-Ulrich Rudel, German pilot, dies (b. 1916). Rudel was a Stuka dive-bomber pilot during World War II and is famous for being the most highly decorated German serviceman of the war. Hans-Ulrich Rudel was the only person to be awarded the Knight’s Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords, and Diamonds.

• 1977 – SA de Transport Aérien Flight 730, an SE-210 Caravelle registered HB-ICK crashed while on approach to Funchal, Portugal, killing 36 of the 47 on board. The pilots had failed to set the altimeter to 1014.0mb, and in when relying only on instruments, they came down into the sea.

• 1972 – (18–25) Frustrated with a lack of progress in peace talks with North Vietnamese negotiators, the United States conducts Operation Linebacker II. Sometimes called “The December Raids” and “The Christmas Bombing”, it involves intense American bombing of North Vietnam, including heavy operations by U. S. Air Force B-52 Stratofortresses and the laying of naval mines in North Vietnamese harbors including Haiphong. On the first day, 86 Boeing B-52 Stratofortress's based at Guam strike Hanoi.

• 1970 – Airbus Industries is formally established to develop the Airbus A300; it comprises Aérospatiale, Deutsche Airbus, Fokker and Hawker Siddeley.

• 1969 – The England-Australia Commemorative Air Race is flown in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Smith brothers' flight. It is won by W. J. Bright and F. L. Buxton in a Britten-Norman Islander.

• 1969 – Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird, 61-7953, Article 2004, crashes near Shoshone, California during test flight out of Edwards Air Force Base, California. Pilot Lt. Col. Joe Rogers and RSO Lt. Col. Gary Heidelbaugh eject safely.

• 1953 – USAF Boeing TB-29 Superfortress, formerly Silverplate Boeing B-29-55-MO, 44-86382, of the 7th Radar Calibration Squadron, Sioux City Air Force Base, Iowa, destroyed by post-crash fire when pilot and co-pilot mistake Ogden Municipal Airport, Utah, for nearby Hill Air Force Base, put down on much shorter runway, overrun threshold, bounce across deep ditch, 10-foot-wide (3.0 m) canal, crosses highway, comes to rest in pieces, followed by immediate fire. One fatality on crew, two others injured.

• 1952 – Avro Canada CF-100 Canuck exceeds M: 1, earlier tests showed M: 0.88.

• 1947 – First flight of the Chase YC-122 Avitruc

• 1944 – Typhoon Cobra (1944) strikes Task Force 38 as it operates in the Philippine Sea east of Luzon. In addition to the sinking of three destroyers, the loss of over 800 men, and damage to many ships, the task force loses 146 carrier aircraft and battleship and cruiser floatplanes. Plans for strikes on Luzon from December 19 to 21 are cancelled.

• 1941 – A RAF Lockheed Hudson III, V9032, of 6 OTU, crashes onto the farmhouse of Quarry Farm at Ingleby Barwick near Thornaby, England, whilst on a training mission when aircraft stalls soon after takeoff. Plane and house destroyed in inferno. Of the occupants, a farmer, his wife and two of his children are killed, two other children, boys aged nine and eleven escape. The twenty-three year old pilot and five other crew members are KWF. The pilot's fiancee offers to adopt the surviving children. Killed are F/Sgt Albert G. Graves RAF, pilot, 23, of Ashford, Kent; Sgt Richard H. D. Palmer RAFVR, pilot, 27; P/O Michael B. Van Heerdan RAFVR, observer, 23, of Pretoria, Transvaal, South Africa; Sgt Leslie Hogg RAFVR, WOp/AG, 27, of West Croydon, Surrey; Sgt Harry W. G. Hewitt RAFVR, WOp/AG, 21, of Teddington; Mr. James R. Garbutt, 39; Mrs. Violet M. Garbutt, 41; Master Alick R. Garbutt, 8; and Master Charles R. Garbutt, 6, all of Quarry Farm, Ingleby Barwick

• 1941 – Lt Buzz Wagner becomes the first US ace of the war.

• 1940 – First flight of the Curtiss SB2C Helldiver

• 1939 – The United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand institute the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan – known in some countries as the Empire Air Training Scheme – A massive joint military aircrew training program. South Africa participates via a parallel Joint Air Training Scheme agreement.

• 1939 – The Royal Air Force abandons daylight raids on Germany after a raid by Vickers Wellingtons takes heavy losses.

• 1936 – The sole Kreider-Reisner XC-31, 34-26, assigned at Wright Field, Ohio, receives moderate damage in a landing accident resulting in a ground loop, at Pittsburgh-Allegheny County Airport, Pennsylvania. Pilot was named Simmerman.

• 1935 – First flight of the Miles Nighthawk

• 1934 – Boeing Airplane Co. subsidiary Stearman Aircraft, located in Wichita, Kan., delivers its first Stearman Kaydet to the military. It will become the most common preliminary trainer in service, and 10,346 Kaydets will be built during World War II.

• 1933 – First flight of the Northrop XFT, American prototype fighter aircraft, single engined low-winged monoplane, designed and built to meet a United States Navy order for an advanced carrier based fighter.

• 1919 – Sir John Alcock (RAF officer) is killed in a crash at Rouen.

• 1908 – Wilbur Wright at Camp d'Auvours, 11 kilometres (6.8 mi) east of Le Mans. flies 99.8 kilometres (62.0 mi) in 1 h 54 min 2/5 s. rising to 110 m (360 ft) – A new world record.

December 19

• 2009 – A Hawker Siddeley HS 748 overruns the runway at Tonj Airfield, Southern Sudan, killing one person on the ground. The aircraft is carrying security personnel in preparation for a visit from President Salva Kiir Mayardit.

• 2005 – Chalk's Ocean Airways Flight 101, a Grumman Mallard, crashes off the coast of Miami Beach, Florida, killing all 20 on board.

• 1999 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-103 at 19:50:00 EST. Mission highlights: Hubble Space Telescope servicing.

• 1997 – SilkAir Flight 185, a Boeing 737, crashes abruptly into the Musi River near Palembang, Indonesia, killing all 102 people on board.

• 1990 – Northwest Airlines buys a 25% share in Hawaiian Airlines

• 1989 – American Airlines purchases the Central and South American routes owned by struggling Eastern Air Lines.

• 1986 – Space Shuttle Columbia mission STS-61 C is aborted at T-minus 31 seconds due to a problem with the solid rocket booster. The clock was set back to T-20 min, but ended again at T-9 min when the launch window closed due to weather. The mission would later depart January 12, and land 10 days before the Challenger accident took place, making it the last successful shuttle mission before the accident.

• 1981 – United States Navy Grumman F-14 Tomcat, BuNo 159623, NG-205, of US Navy Fighter Squadron 24 VF-24 is lost during a carrier landing mishap aboard USS_Constellation_(CV-64), deployed in the Indian Ocean. Aircraft caught the #4 arresting cable, which was set for the wrong aircraft weight. Pilot and RIO ejected successfully and were rescued by an SH-3 flown by HS-8 (now HSC-8). The Tomcat sank after floating a few minutes. Video of this mishap is posted on YouTube.

• 1980 – New York Air begins airline operations.

• 1978 – First flight of the Beriev A-50

• 1976 – A Piper Cherokee buzzes Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, Maryland, minutes after the conclusion of a National Football League playoff game between the Baltimore Colts and the Pittsburgh Steelers and crashes into the stadium's upper deck. There are no serious injuries, and the pilot is arrested for violating air safety regulations.

• 1978 – Retired: Fairey Gannet.

• 1956 – Seventeenth Lockheed U-2A, 56-6690, Article 357, delivered to the Central Intelligence Agency 21 September 1956, crashes in Arizona this date, Detachment C pilot Bob Ericson successfully bailing out after losing control due to hypoxia caused by a faulty oxygen feed.

• 1950 – AFirst prototype Douglas XA2D-1 Skyshark, BuNo 122988, c/n 7045, crashes at Edwards AFB, California, on its 15th flight. Taken up by Navy Lt. Cdr. Hugh Wood for dive tests, the first was initiated from 30,000 feet (9,100 m). During the 5g pullout from the second dive, begun at 20,000 feet (6,100 m), vapor begins trailing from the airframe, soon enveloping it, but stops when the ventral dive brakes are retracted. While turning back for a visual inspection from the ground, the XA2D begins losing altitude rapidly. Pilot attempts to land on the dry lakebed but is unable to flare properly and the dive angle is too steep. With the undercarriage in the down position, the airframe strikes the ground at high speed at a 30 degree angle, shearing off the gear, the prototype then sliding several hundred yards before burning, killing the pilot. Investigation finds that the starboard power section of the coupled Allison XT40A turboprop engine had failed and did not declutch, allowing the Skyshark to fly on the power of the opposite section, nor did the propellers feather. As the wings' lift disappeared, a fatal sink rate was induced. Additional instrumentation and an automatic decoupler are added to the second prototype, but by the time it is ready to fly on 3 April 1952, sixteen months have passed, and with all-jet designs being developed, the A2D program is essentially dead. Total flight time on the lost airframe were barely 20 hours.

• 1945 – Cabinet approved the formation of an Air Component of the Royal Canadian Navy.

• 1945 – First flight of the Grumman AF Guardian

• 1944 – The U. S. Navy submarine USS Redfish (SS-395) torpedoes and sinks the Japanese aircraft carrier Unryū in the East China Sea with the loss of 1,239 lives. There are 147 survivors.

• 1944 – 2nd Lt. Robin C. Pennington of VMF-914 out of MCAS Cherry Point, North Carolina, is killed in the crash of Brewster F3A-1 Corsair, BuNo 04634, 'L69', while on a GCI training mission to intercept a North American PBJ Mitchell, his fighter coming down in a swampy area .25 miles (0.40 km) E of Great Lakes, North Carolina, striking the ground left wing low. Privately recovered in 1990, there then follows a legal battle with the National Museum of Naval Aviation in 1994 which tries to lay claim to the rare Brewster-produced model (only 735 versus the 12,571 built by Vought) which is only finally resolved in the private individual's favour by an Act of the U.S. Congress in 2005.

• 1941 – No. 420 (Bomber) Squadron was formed in England.

• 1928 – Harold Pitcairn flies his first autogiro.

• 1916 – Captain MM Bell-Irving flying a Morane Scout of No. 1 Squadron, RFC, claimed first Canadian victory by destroying an enemy aircraft. He was awarded DSO.

• 1910 – Imperial Japanese Army Captain Yoshitoshi Tokugawa makes the first heavier-than-air flight in Japan piloting a Farman III (biplane).

• 1908 – The world’s first aerodrome, Port-Aviation, is opened 12 miles (19 km) outside of Paris.

December 20

• Syrian Air Force aircraft drop cluster bombs onto neighborhoods and homes in Mare', Syria. A local hospital reports four dead and 23 wounded.^[1]

• 2008 – Continental Airlines Flight 1404, a Boeing 737-500 with 115 people on board, veers off the runway upon takeoff from Denver International Airport, comes to rest in a ravine near the runway and catches fire. There are no fatalities, over 38 people are injured, at least two of them seriously.

• 2004 – A Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor crashes on takeoff at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, prompting the U.S. Air Force to ground most of its other F-22s. The pilot ejected safely from the Lockheed Martin-built jet, which smashed into the runway it was trying to leave at about 1545 hrs. local time.

• 1995 – American Airlines Flight 965, a Boeing 757, crashes into a mountain while approaching Santiago de Cali, Colombia; of the 164 people on board, only 4 people and a dog survive.

• 1992 – Northwest and KLM introduce a new joint logo: “Worldwide Reliability”.

• 1989 – The United States invasion of Panama, Operation Just Cause, begins with over 300 U. S. military aircraft participating. The U. S. Air Force's F-117A Nighthawk stealth fighter and the U. S. Army's AH-64 Apache attack helicopter make their combat debuts. One of the first U. S. operations is an air assault by the 1st Battalion (Airborne) of the U. S. Army's 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment which secures Fort Amador.

• 1983 – Ozark Air Lines Flight 650, a Douglas DC-9, collides with a snow plow in Sioux Falls, South Dakota; all on board survive, however the driver of the snow plow is killed.

• 1981 With Capt. Don Eddie in command the last official CF Otter flight took place from Downsview.

• 1972 – In the 1972 Chicago-O'Hare runway collision, Delta Airlines Flight 954, a Convair CV-880, and North Central Airlines Flight 575, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9-31, collide, killing 10 people and injuring 17.

• 1970 – with pre-tax losses of $US 130 million, the year ends as the worst ever for US airlines.

• 1969 – The highest-scoring North Vietnamese ace of the Vietnam War, Nguyễn Văn Cốc, scores his final victory, claimed as over an AQM-34 Firebee unmanned aerial vehicle but possibly over an OV-10 Bronco. The North Vietnamese Air Force credits him with nine victories, while the United States confirms seven.

• 1962 – NASA research pilot Milton O. Thompson, after making an X-15 weather evaluation flight for an impending launch in NASA Lockheed JF-104A-10-LO Starfighter, 56-0749, c/n 183-1037, makes simulated X-15 approach at Rogers Dry Lake, Edwards Air Force Base, California, experiences asymmetric flap condition that results in uncommanded roll. Unable to resolve problem by repeatedly cycling the roll and yaw dampers, flap-selector switch and speed brakes, he ejects inverted at 18,000 feet (5,500 m) after the airframe makes four complete rolls. Fighter impacts nose first on Edwards bombing range. Pilot descends safely and walks to nearby road where NASA Flight Operations chief Joe Vensel, speeding to the crash site expecting the worst as Thompson had not radioed that he was ejecting, finds him waiting uninjured. Investigation finds that the crash had most likely been the result of an electrical malfunction in the left trailing-edge flap.

• 1957 – First flight of the Boeing 707 commercial airliner.

• 1954 – The Convair YF-102 A Delta Dagger makes its first flight at Edwards Air Force Base.

• 1952 – A United States Air Force Douglas C-124A Globemaster II, 50-0100, c/n 43238, crashed on takeoff from Larson AFB, Moses Lake, Washington, United States. 115 on board (105 Passengers, 10 Crew); 87 killed (82 Passengers, 5 Crew). This was the highest confirmed death toll of any disaster in aviation history at the time.

• 1944 – With an abundance of male pilots now available to ferry military aircraft from factories to airfields, the U. S. Army Air Forces Air Transport Command's Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) organization is disbanded.

• 1943 — After much effort following Ernst Heinkel's initial proposal on November 17, 1938 to power two prototypes of it (the V3 and V4 airframes) with four "individual" inverted V12 engines, the He 177 V102 four-engined prototype for the Heinkel He 177B heavy bomber makes its first flight on four discrete Daimler-Benz DB 603 powerplants.^[2]

• 1942 – (overnight) A de Havilland Mosquito of Royal Air Force Bomber Command uses the Oboe blind bombing targeting system operationally for the first time in a raid against a power station at Lutterade in the Netherlands

• 1941 – The Nationalist Chinese Air Force's American Volunteer Group, the "Flying Tigers", sees its first combat near Kunming, China.

• 1934 – United Airlines Flight 6 was a scheduled flight departing from Chicago, Illinois to Omaha, Nebraska on 1934. Shortly after departing Chicago power was lost on the right engine, and the crew notified Chicago that they were returning. Then power was lost on the left engine and a forced landing was attempted. The aircraft struck some trees. The cause was believed to be carburetor icing.

• 1934 – A KLM Douglas DC-2 registered PH-AJU crashes into the desert during a flight from Amsterdam Netherlands to Jakarta, Indonesia, killing all 7 on board.

• 1934 – United States Coast Guard Lieutenant Richard L. Burke sets a world seaplane speed record of 308.750 kilometres per hour (191.848 mph) over a 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) test course flying a Grumman JF Duck.

• 1928 – Australian George Wilkins and Lieutenant Carl Eielson make the first flight over Antarctica. They use a Lockheed Vega for the 10-hour flight.

• 1924 – First RCAF Wings Parade took place at Camp Borden, Ontario. W/C LS Breadner presented wings to F/L Higgins, P/O Carr-Harris, P/O Anderson, P. O Durnin, P/O Slemon, P/O Weaver.

• 1916 – The US Army Balloon School is established in Fort Omaha, Nebraska.

• 1910 – Chile establishes its first military aviation arm, the Chilean Army's Military Aviation Service of Chile.

December 21

• 2012 – The Republic of South Sudan'sSudan 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.^[1][2]

• 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 AardvarkatCarswell 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).

December 22

• 2009 – American Airlines Flight 331, a Boeing 737-800 from Miami International Airport overruns the runway at Norman Manley International Airport, Kingston, Jamaica; there are 40 injuries and no fatalities.

• 2001 – On board American Airlines Flight 63, a Boeing 767, a passenger, Richard Reid, attempts to detonate explosives hidden in his shoes, but fails and is subdued by two flight attendants and passengers. The plane lands safely in Boston.

• 1999 – Korean Air Cargo Flight 8509, a Boeing 747-200F, crashes after take-off near Great Hallingbury, England; killing all 4 crew.

• 1998 – First flight of the Beechcraft Premier I

• 1992 – Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 1103, a Boeing 727, collides with a Libyan Air Force MiG-23 near Tripoli International Airport, killing all 159 on board both aircraft.

• 1980 – Saudia Flight 162, a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, suffers an explosive decompression over Qatar, killing two passengers who were sucked out of the aircraft; the cause is traced to a fatigue failure of a main landing gear wheel flange.

• 1979 – First flight of the Socata TB 30 Epsilon

• 1977 – First flight of the Antonov An-72

• 1976 – First flight of the Ilyushin Il-86

• 1974 – Avensa Flight 358, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9, suffers dual engine failure after takeoff and crashes near Maturín, Venezuela, killing all 77 on board; the cause is never determined.

• 1969 – A USAF General Dynamics F-111A, 67-0049, c/n A1-94, crashes near Nellis AFB, Nevada, killing both crew, when starboard wing fails in flight, wing carry-through box failure, resulting in the fifth grounding order since the type entered service. Fifteen F-111s have crashed to this point.

• 1969 – A USN Vought F-8J Crusader, BuNo 150879, of VF-194, crashes into hangar at NAS Miramar, California during emergency landing, killing 14 and injuring 30. Pilot Lt. C. M. Riddell ejects safely. Five other fighters, including two McDonnell F-4 Phantom IIs, are damaged in the repair facility fire that ensues. Helicopters and military and civilian ambulances were used to transport the injured to Balboa Naval Hospital, San Diego.

• 1968 – The first CF-5D was taken on strength by the CAF.

• 1966 – First flight of the Northrop HL-10

• 1965 – American aircraft attack industrial targets in North Vietnam for the first time.

• 1965 – Entered service: Convair CV-640 with Caribair

• 1964 – First flight of the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird

• 1964 – First flight of the Lockheed D-21 Drone

• 1961 – U. S. Army helicopters engage in their first combat operation in Vietnam as the 8th Transportation Company makes several airlifts of South Vietnamese ground troops to landing zones in South Vietnam south of Saigon.

• 1954 – Capt. Richard J. Harer, test pilot with the Air Force Flight Test Center, Edwards AFB, California, belly lands a Lockheed F-94C Starfire on Rogers Dry Lake following engine problems, becomes trapped in the cockpit as the aircraft burns. Capt. Milburn "Mel" Apt, flying chase in another fighter, lands beside the failing F-94 and succeeds in pulling Harer from the burning jet, saving his life. Harer suffers a broken back, third degree burns and compound fractures of both legs that result in their amputation.

• 1953 – Pilot on a routine training mission from Eglin Air Force Base survives a crash landing in an Republic F-84 Thunderjet at Lee, Florida.

• 1953 – First unofficial flight of the Lockheed XFV when pilot pushes throttles too far on taxi test.

• 1949 – USAF Boeing B-50A-30-BO Superfortress, 47-110, c/n 15794,[209] of the 2d Bombardment Group, crashes into swamp land on the banks of the Savannah River ~7 miles above Savannah, Georgia, five minutes after take off at 2112 hrs. from Chatham AFB, 4 Miles ENE of the airfield. The bomber was on a training flight to Biggs AFB, El Paso, Texas. All eleven on board KWF. The crash site was less than two miles from U.S. Highway 17, which crosses the river just above Savannah, but it could only be reached by small boats guided by boatmen who knew the river. The Air Force waited until dawn to send a large crash boat with a score or more men, armed with shovels and ropes, to try to remove the bodies. They had to transfer to small, flat-bottomed swamp boats to get to the wreckage. Capt. E. S. Harrison, public information officer, said the wreckage would cover a football field. Salvage workers sank up to their armpits in the mire. The men aboard the plane were identified as: Capt. George V. Scaringen, pilot, and aircraft commander, Columbia, South Carolina; Capt. Andrew G. Walker, pilot, Norfolk, Virginia; Lt. Rogers Hornsby, Jr., 29, son of Rogers Hornsby of baseball fame; 1st Lt. Robert W. Beckman, bombardier, Birmingham, Alabama; Capt. Anthony C. Colandro, radar navigator, Baltimore, Maryland; 1st Lt. James W. Johnson, Jr., flight engineer, Wells, West Virginia; T/Sgt. Leonard B. Hughes, flight engineer, Denison, Texas; S/Sgt. Fred W. Cunningham, radio operator and gunner, New Orleans, Louisiana; S/Sgt. Manson L. Gregg, gunner, Meadow, Texas; S/Sgt. Garnell W. Myers, gunner, Franklin, Indiana; and S/Sgt. Billy C. Bristol, gunner, Tucson, Arizona.

• 1949 – First flight of the North American F-86D Sabre

• 1945 – Two Boeing C-97 Stratofreighters, on their first peacetime mission, carry 190 servicemen from Seattle to Chicago in time for Christmas.

• 1945 – First flight of the Beechcraft Bonanza

• 1944 – Retired: Curtiss XP-60.

• 1943 – Lt. Col. William Edwin Dyess (1916–1943) is killed when the Lockheed P-38G-10-LO Lightning, 42-13441, of the 337th Fighter Squadron, 329d Fighter Group, he is undergoing retraining in catches fire in flight near Burbank, California. He refuses to bail out over a populated area and dies when his Lightning impacts in a vacant lot at 109 Myers St, Burbank, saving countless civilians on the ground. Dyess had been captured on Bataan in April 1942 by the Japanese, but escaped in April 1943 and fought with guerrilla forces on Mindanao until evacuated by the submarine USS Trout in July 1943. Abilene Air Force Base, Texas, is named for him on 1 December 1956.

• 1941 – First flight of the Fairey Firefly

• 1941 – First flight of the Consolidated TBY Sea Wolf

• 1939 – First flight of the Petlyakov VI-100

• 1938 – First flight of the de Havilland Flamingo

• 1937 – (9 &22) Air battles take place between Imperial Japanese Navy and Nationalist Chinese aircraft over Nanchang on December 9

• 1936 – First flight of the North American XB-21

• 1930 – First flight of the Tupolev TB-3

• 1910 – British aviation pioneer Cecil Grace vanishes over the English Channel during a flight from Calais, France, to Dover, England.

December 23

• 2012 – Over a period of 17 minutes, three waves of Syrian Air Force aircraft attack the only bakery operating in Halfaya, Syria, where hundreds of people had gathered to buy the first fresh bread available in the area for days, killing dozens. Opposition groups estimate the number of dead at anywhere from fewer than 100 to as many as 300 people.^[1]

• 2009 – Thai Air Force Northrop F-5E (211 Sq. coded 21118/91681) fighter aircraft crashed in Thailand. Pilot Chatchawan Rassamee died.

• 2005 – Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 217, an Antonov An-140, crashes 5 minutes after takeoff from Baku Airport due to instrument failure; all 23 on board die.

• 2002 – A MQ-1 Predator is shot down by an Iraqi MiG-25, making it the first time in history that an aircraft and an unmanned drone had engaged in combat.

• 1990 – First flight of the Boeing VC-25(No. 29000)

• 1986 – Voyager, piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, lands at Edwards Air Force Base in California becoming the first aircraft to fly non-stop, non-refueled around the world.

• 1982 – First flight of the Short C-23 Sherpa

• 1979 – Turkish Airlines Fokker F28 crashes into a hillside near Kuyumcuköy, Ankara, Turkey while on approach to Esenboğa Airport; of the 45 on board, only 4 survive.

• 1978 – Alitalia Flight 4128, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32, crashed into the Tyrrhenian Sea when on approach to Palermo International Airport in Palermo, Italy. 108 of the 129 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 1975 – LTV A-7D Corsair II, 67-14586, c/n D.005, while assigned to Eglin AFB, Florida's 3246th Test Wing, Air Development & Test Center for mission support, suffers engine failure on take-off from Tallahassee Municipal Airport, Florida and makes forced landing, coming down largely intact. Airframe is hauled back to Eglin AFB on a truck, where it is either scrapped or becomes a target hulk.

• 1975 – General Dynamics FB-111A-CF, 68-290, c/n B1-62, crashes in the area of the Ashland forest in Maine, ~45 minutes after take-off from Loring AFB, Maine.

• 1974 – First flight of the Rockwell B-1 Lancer

• 1973 – First flight of the Aero Boero 260AG

• 1972 – Braathens SAFE Flight 239, a Fokker F-28, crashes in Asker upon landing at Fornebu airport, Oslo, Norway, killing 40 of 45 people on board.

• 1972 – Andrei Tupolev dies, aged 86

• 1966 – First flight of the Dassault Mirage F1

• 1961 – In Operation Chopper, U. S. Army helicopters airlift 1,000 South Vietnamese paratroopers to attack a suspected Viet Cong headquarters in South Vietnam 10 miles (16 km) west of Saigon.

• 1950 – AU.S. Navy Lockheed P2V-3W Neptune, BuNo 124357, of VP-931, NAS Whidbey Island, crashes on McCreight Mountain, Vancouver Island, British Columbia. Wreckage found 21 September 1961, according to Joe Baugher. Pilot Lt. Lalonde M. Pinne and ten crew KWF. Another source cites crash date of 18 December 1950. Yet another source lists discovery date as 21 October 1951, found by a Canadian aircraft that was off-course.

• 1943 – American aircraft based at Tarawa strike Nauru.

• 1943 – (23-25) Air Solomons (AirSols) aircraft strike Rabaul heavily, U. S. Navy carrier aircraft strike Kavieng on New Ireland, and Fifth Air Force aircraft attack Japanese positions at Cape Gloucester and Cape Hoskins on New Britain.

• 1941 – First flight of the Douglas C-47 Skytrain

• 1940 – The first U. S. all-cargo air service is inaugurated by United Air Lines when at 11:30 P. M. a flight leaves New York for Chicago, where it arrives at 3:40 A. M. local time the following morning after stopping in Cleveland.

• 1940 – Eddie August Schneider dies in crash when his plane is clipped by a U. S. Navy bomber at Floyd Bennett Field.

• 1939 – Anthony Fokker, pioneer in aviation and a Dutch-American aircraft manufacturer dies in New York, aged 49

• 1938 – First flight of the Blackburn Roc

• 1929 – Trans-Canada (McKee) Trophy was awarded to ‘Wop’ May for his flight carrying a diphtheria anti-toxin from Edmonton to Fort Vermillion, Alberta.

• 1910 – Lt Theodore Ellyson of the United States Navy is assigned to flight training with the Curtiss company, making him the first naval aviator.

December 24

• 2012 – An American unmanned aerial vehicle strike in eastern Yemen kills five al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula members riding motorcycles in the city of Shehr, including Abdullah Bawazir and Nabil al Kaldi. Another strike kills two other members of the group in the central Yemeni city of Rada'a.^[1]

• 1999 – Indian Airlines Flight 814, an Airbus A300, is hijacked en route to Delhi, India; one hostage is killed.

• 1996 – A Learjet 35A crashed near Lebanon, New Hampshire which led to the longest missing aircraft search in that state's history, lasting almost three years.

• 1994 – Air France Flight 8969, an Airbus A300, is hijacked on the tarmac at Algiers, Algeria by the militant group GIA. After a two-day standoff, the plane is allowed to fly to Marseille, France, where it is stormed by French commandos who kill the hijackers.

• 1989 – Major combat operations in Operation Just Cause conclude.

• 1973 – First flight of the Kamov Ka-27

• 1971 – LANSA Flight 508, a Lockheed L-188 Electra en route from Lima to Pucallpa, Peru, breaks apart in mid-air after being set aflame by lightning; it crashes in the Amazon Rainforest and 91 people die; one German teenage girl, Juliane Koepcke, survives after falling 2 miles (3.2 km) down into the rainforest strapped to her seat; she walks through the jungle for 10 days until being rescued by local lumbermen.

• 1968 – Allegheny Airlines Flight 736, a Convair CV-580, crashes while on approach to Bradford Regional Airport. 20 of the 47 passengers and crew on board are killed.

• 1968 – Apollo 8 orbits the moon carrying Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders.

• 1966 – A Canadair CL-44 chartered by the United States military crashes into a small village in South Vietnam, killing 129.

• 1964 – Flying Tiger Line Flight 282, a Lockheed Constellation, crashes near San Bruno, California after an unexplained course deviation, killing the crew of three.

• 1963 – New York International Airport is rededicated as John F. Kennedy International Airport in honor of the murdered president.

• 1962 – First flight of the Aérospatiale N 262

• 1958 – The 1958 Bristol Britannia 312 crash occurred near Christchurch, Dorset, England, killing 9 of 12 on board.

• 1955 – NORAD tracks Santa for the first time. This began when a Colorado-based Sears store had published a number for children to be able to call Santa Claus. A typo was made, and the number instead led to the hotline for the Director of Operations at Continental Air Defense Command. Realizing the mistake, the director told his team to give the position of Santa to whoever had called in.

• 1952 – First flight of the Handley Page Victor

• 1946 – J Wade and JG Twist, flying a Grumman Goose, rescued three men from an ice floe in the Gulf of St Lawrence after Canadian Pacific Air Lines D. H. 89A made a forced landing.

• 1944 – A U. S. Army Air Forces strike by Seventh Air Force B-24 s on Iwo Jima is combined with a bombardment by U. S. Navy surface ships, but Japanese air raids on Saipan resume later in the day as 25 Japanese aircraft destroy one B-29 and damage three more beyond repair.

• 1944 – The people of the Philippines received a surprise when airplanes of 43rd Bombing Group flew over to drop 500,000 "Christmas cards" that were in fact leaflets addressed to the Filipinos from the American Forces of Liberation and contains Christmas and New Years sentiments.

• 1942 – A major U. S. airstrike against Munda airfield destroys four Mitsubishi A6 M Zeroes in the air, 10 more on takeoff, and 12 waiting to take off. Later in the day, additional strikes destroy Japanese landing barges and bomb the airfield’s runway.

• 1937 – First flight of the Macchi C.200

• 1916 – Entered Service: Sopwith Pup with No. 54 Squadron RFC

• 1908 – The world’s first aeronautical exhibition opens in Paris when the French president inaugurated the second half of the Annual Automobile Salon at the Grand Palais.

December 25

• 2012 – The crew of an Air Bagan Fokker 100 with 71 people on board for a domestic flight in Burma from RangoontoHeho via Mandalay mistakes a road for the runway while descending to land at Heho in heavy fog, hits power lines, and crash-lands either on the road or in a neaby rice paddy and burns, killing a tour guide and injuring eleven other people aboard the plane. A man on the ground riding a bicycle also is killed.^[1]

• 2012 – An Antonov An-72 military transport aircraft belonging to the military forcesofKazakhstan carrying a crew of seven and 20 members of the Kazakhstan Border Guard Service crashes in bad weather about 20 km (12 miles) from Shymkent while descending to a landing there after a domestic flight from Astana, killing everyone on board. The acting Director of the Kazakhstan Border Guard Service, Colonel Turganbeck Stambekov, is among the dead, along with one of his deputies and a number of regional Border Guard commanders.^[2][3]

• 2009 – Northwest Airlines Flight 253, an Airbus A330-300 is attacked by a man using a small explosive device, causing only a small fire inside the plane, which is extinguished by a flight attendant; the man is subdued by passengers and crew; there are 3 injuries.

• 2003 – UTAGE Flight 141, a Boeing 727, runs off the end of the runway upon takeoff at Cotonou, Benin and crashes onto the beach on the Bight of Benin, killing 151 of the 163 occupants.

• 1999 – Cubana de Aviación Flight 310, a Yakovlev Yak-42D, crashes into the San Luis Hill near Bejuma, Venezuela while on approach to Arturo Michelena International Airport; all 22 on board die.

• 1997 – First flight of the Gulfstream G200

• 1986 – Iraqi Airways Flight 163, a Boeing 737, is hijacked by Hezbollah militants while en route to Amman, Jordan. A shootout with security forces causes the plane to crash, killing 63 of the 106 people on board.

• 1981 – USAF lieutenant Thomas Tiller is rescued from the Atlantic Ocean by a boat after his plane, a F-4 Phantom had an accident seven days before.

• 1979 – Antonov An-12s and An-22s airlift the first Soviet troops into Afghanistan. 5,000 arrive in the first 24 hours.

• 1976 – EgyptAir Flight 864, a Boeing 707, crashes into an industrial complex near Bangkok, Thailand due to pilot error; all 52 on board are killed as well as another 19 on the ground.

• 1972 – The United States begins a 36-hour pause in the bombing of North Vietnam.

• 1968 – Apollo 8 performs the very first successful Trans Earth Injection (TEI) maneuver, sending the crew and spacecraft on a trajectory back to Earth from Lunar orbit.

• 1966 – (25-26) The United States conducts a 48-hour stand-down of air operations over Vietnam for the Christmas holiday.

• 1965 – Hoping to begin peace talks with the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration orders a cessation of American air strikes in Vietnam.

• 1959 – Michael P. Anderson, astronaut, was born (d. 2003). Anderson was a United States Lieutenant Colonel (USAF), a NASA astronaut, and the Space Shuttle payload commander of STS-107 (Columbia) who was killed when the craft disintegrated after reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere.

• 1958 – First flight of the Sukhoi Su-11

• 1954 – BOAC Boeing 377 Stratocruiser G-ALSA crashes on landing at Glasgow Prestwick Airport, killing 28 of the 36 passengers and crew on board.

• 1946 – Nicknamed “Black Christmas”, three passenger planes, all flying in from Chongqing, China, crash due to fog in separate incidents in Shanghai, China, killing at least 62 of the combined 68 passengers and 9 crew members aboard. Two of the planes belong to China National Aviation Corporation and one to Central Air Transport.

• 1940 – Two British Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm Grumman Martlets of 804 Naval Air Squadron shoot down a German Junkers Ju 88 off Scapa Flow. It is the first aerial victory in Europe by an American-made aircraft in history and the first by any variant of the Grumman F4 F Wildcat.

• 1934 – French pilot Raymond Delmotte sets a new world speed record for land planes of 314.33 miles per hour (505.87 km/h), flying a Caudron 460.

• 1924 – An Imperial Airways de Havilland DH.34 crashes near Purley, Surrey, killing all 8 on board; the cause is never determined.

• 1914 – HMS Empress, HMS Engadine and HMS Riviera launch a seaplane attack on the Zeppelin sheds at Cuxhaven. Fog prevents the aircraft from reaching their target, and only three of the nine aircraft find their way back to their mother ships.

December 26

• 2005 – At around 6 PM local time, a Piper Aztec, Registered N444DA, crashed in shallow water off the coast of the island of South Caicos, Turks and Caicos Islands. Its destination was Providenciales International Airport. All 4 on board (1 pilot 3 passengers) died.

• 2005 – An AH-64D Apache 03-5375 from 1–4th Aviation Regiment collides with another Apache near Baghdad, both crewmembers are killed.^[1][2] Second AH-64 wasn’t destroyed.

• 1989 – United Express Flight 2415 operated by a BAe Jetstream 31 N410UE of North Pacific Airlines was a commuter flight in the United States from Yakima, Washington to Pasco, Washington. The aircraft was approaching Tri-Cities Airport at around 22:30. The crew executed an excessively steep and unstabilized ILS approach. That approach, along with improper air traffic control commands and aircraft icing, caused the aircraft to stall and crash short of the runway. Both crew members and all four passengers were killed.

• 1989 – First flight of the Hongdu N-5

• 1982 – First flight of the Antonov An-124 (“Condor”)

• 1980 – Aeroflot puts the Ilyushin Il-86 into service on its Moscow-Tashkent route.

• 1975 – Introduction: Tupolev TU-144

• 1972 – 117 B-52 Stratofortresses attack HanoiinOperation Linebacker II, the largest air assault in the Vietnam War to this time.

• 1971 – (26–30) The United States conducts Operation Proud Deep Alpha, which consists of air strikes in three provinces of North Vietnam south of the 20th Parallel.

• 1968 – Two members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine attack El Al Flight 253, a Boeing 707, with a submachine gun and hand grenades as it prepares to depart Athens, Greece, killing one passenger and seriously wounding a flight attendant before being arrested.

• 1967 – The Soviet Union commissions its first helicopter carrier, Moskva.

• 1965 – American air strikes in South Vietnam and Laos resume.

• 1961 – The first missile squadron of the RCAF, No.446 Surface/Air Missile Squadron was formed in North Bay.

• 1956 – First flight of the Convair F-106 Delta Dart

• 1952 – Wisconsin Central Airlines changes its name to North Central Airlines, and moves its headquarters from Clintonville, Wisconsin, to Minneapolis, Minnesota.

• 1948 – I. V. Fedorov becomes the first Soviet pilot to break the sound barrier. He achieves the necessary speed by diving his Lavochkin La-176 jet, powered by a Rolls-Royce Nene engine, at full throttle.

• 1944 – RCAF provided 61 Halifax heavy bombers in a 270-plane raid on St. Vith, France.

• 1943 – 70 to 80 Japanese Rabaul-based aircraft attack U. S. ships supporting the day’s U. S. landing at Cape Gloucester, sinking a destroyer and damaging two others. Minor raids follow on the next two days.

• 1943 – (26-27) Japanese Rabaul-based aircraft raid U. S. forces off Arawe.

• 1939 – The first RAAF squadrons to join the war arrive in Britain

• 1935 – General Rodolfo Graziani requests permission from Benito Mussolini to use poison gas against Ethiopian forces during the Second Italo-Abyssinian War. He receives it, and during the last few days of December Italian aircraft begin dropping mustard gas on Ethiopian troops around the Takkaze River and on the village of Jijiga. Italian planes will drop poison gas for the remainder of the war, and continue to use it against Ethiopian guerrillas after the war ends.

December 27

• 2012 – Syrian rebel forces claim to have shot down a Syrian Air Force in western Syria near Morek with antiaircraft artillery fire.^[1]

• 2006 – 2006 Morecambe Bay Helicopter Crash was a fatal air incident that occurred at approximately 18:40 GMT, whilst replacement crew were being transported between the Millom and Morecambe gas platforms situated approximately 24 miles (39 km) from the shoreline of Morecambe Bay, Lancashire, England.

• 1992 – USAF F-16 Fighting Falcons shoot down an Iraqi Air Force Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 in Southern Iraq's "no fly zone"

• 1991 – Both engines of Scandinavian Airlines Flight 751, a McDonnell-Douglas MD-81, fail shortly after takeoff from Stockholm, Sweden. The pilots successfully make an emergency landing in a nearby field, injuring 25 passengers but incurring not a single fatality.

• 1985 – Members of the Abu Nidal Organization launch coordinated attacks at airports in Italy and Austria. Four gunmen open fire at the El Al and TWA counter at Leonardo Da Vinco-Flumicino Airport in Rome, killing 16 and injured nearly 100 others. At the same time, 3 men do the same at Vienna International Airport while people were getting ready to board a flight to Israel, killing 3 and injuring 40. Of the 7 shooters, 4 were killed and the others arrested.

• 1982 – John Leonard ‘Jack’ Swigert, Jr., American astronaut, dies (b. 1931). Swigert was one of three astronauts aboard the ill-fated Apollo 13 moon mission, which was launched on April 11, 1970. Originally part of the backup crew for the mission, he was assigned to the mission just days before launch, replacing astronaut Ken Mattingly.

• 1972 – The U. S. Marine Corps loses a fixed-wing aircraft over Vietnam for the last time.

• 1968 – Apollo 8 splashes down in the Pacific Ocean, ending humanity’s first manned mission to the Moon.

• 1968 – North Central Airlines Flight 458, a Convair CV-580, crashes into a hangar at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois, killing 27 of the 45 people on board and one person on the ground.

• 1951 – First flight of the North American FJ-2/-3 Fury

• 1949 – US carriers American Airlines and TWA begin coast-to coast coach-class flights with 60-passenger DC-4 s, charging US $110 one-way.

• 1947 – In the 1947 Korangi Creek crash, an Air India Douglas DC-3 crashes shortly after takeoff, killing all 23 on board.

• 1942 – First flight of the Kawanishi N1K (N1 K1-J)

• 1942 – First flight of the Mitsubishi Ki-67

• 1941 – No. 404 (Coastal Fighter) Squadron provided air support for a Commando raid on Vaagso, Norway.

• 1941 – (27-28) 132 British bombers attack Düsseldorf, Germany.

• 1936 – United Airlines Trip 34, a Boeing 247, crashes at Rice Canyon due to pilot error, killing all 12 on board.

• 1935 – The USAAC uses aerial bombardment to divert a flow of lava from Mauna Loa, Hawaii that is threatening Hilo's waterworks.

• 1922 – The Hosho, Japan's first aircraft carrier is commissioned.

• 1919 – First flight of the Boeing Model 6

• 1773 – George Cayley was born. As a Pioneer of early aviation regarded by many as the father of flight. His glider had taken his coachman on the first manned flight in 1853.

December 28

• 2012 – Press observers begin to observe daily Myanmar Air Force strikes against rebel Kachin Independence Army forces in northern Myanmar. The strikes reportedly will continue into early January 2013.^[1]

• 2012 – Syrian rebels increase pressure against a government helicopter base and fight with government soldiers near Aleppo International Airport as they continue their offensive against government airbases. They claim to have surrounded four airports and airbases in the Aleppo Governorate, halting all activity at one and firing antiaircraft artillery at all approaching aircraft at another.^[2]

• 2012 – The Syrian Air Force strikes al-Safira, killing 14 people.^[3]

• 2012 – An airstike kills two suspected al-Qaeda members in Hadramawt province in southwestern Yemen. Local residents and Yemeni officials claim an American unmanned aerial vehicle conducted the strike.^[4]

• 2010 – Antonov An-22 RA-09343 of the Russian Air Force crashed at Krasny Oktaybr, Russia killing all twelve crew. The aircraft was on a positioning flight from Voronezh AirporttoTver-Migalovo Airport.^[5]

• 2001 – USA3000 Airlines began operations.

• 1997 – United Airlines Flight 826, a Boeing 747, encounters severe turbulence two hours into the flight; the aircraft safely lands back in Tokyo; all survive the accident, but a passenger dies later; despite having no damage, the aircraft is written off.

• 1989 – McDonnell-Douglas F-15C-41-MC Eagle. 86-0153, c/n 1000/C381, of the 59th TFS, 33rd TFW, based at Eglin AFB, crashes in the Gulf of Mexico, 40 miles (64 km) SE of Apalachicola, Florida, pilot killed. The pilot was identified as Capt. Bartle M. Jackson, 31, Towson, Maryland. At the time of the crash, Jackson and three other pilots—a second F-15 pilot from Eglin and two Lockheed Martin F-16 pilots from Moody Air Force Base, Georgia, were taking part in a training mission the Air Force calls a 2v2, which pits two F-15s against two F-16s in a mock dogfight. It was not known whether the pilot had been able to bail out over the Gulf of Mexico. Other pilots in the area had not seen a parachute.

• 1988 – First flight of the Let L-610

• 1988 – McDonnell Douglas F-15E dual-role fighters go into operational service at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N. C.

• 1988 – An analysis of the wreckage of the Pan Am Boeing 747, which crashed at Lockerbie, Scotland a week ago, reveals that a bomb had been planted in the jet’s luggage hold.

• 1985 – First flight of the Fokker 50

• 1978 – United Airlines Flight 173, a Douglas DC-8, runs out of fuel while circling near Portland, Oregon, United States, as the crew investigates a light indicating a problem with the landing gear; the plane crashes in a wooded area, killing 10 and injuring 24 of the 181 on board.

• 1975 – The Soviet Union commissions the “heavy aircraft-carrying cruiser” Kiev, the first Soviet or Russian ship capable of operating fixed-wing aircraft. A hybrid ship combining a partial angled flight deck with the heavy antiship missile armament of a Soviet guided-missile cruiser, she operates only vertical or short takeoff and landing (VSTOL) jets and helicopters.

• 1968 – Israeli commandos mount a surprise raidonBeirut Airport, destroying 13 aircraft and jeopardising the Lebanese aviation industry.

• 1965 – CIA pilot Mele Vojvodich, Jr. takes Lockheed A-12, 60-6929, Article 126, for a functional check flight (FCF) after a period of deep maintenance, but seconds after take-off from Groom Dry Lake, Nevada, the aircraft yaws uncontrollably, pilot ejecting at 100 feet (30 m) after six seconds of flight, escaping serious injury. Investigation finds that the pitch stability augmentation system (SAS) had been connected to the yaw SAS actuators, and vice versa. SAS connectors are changed to make such wiring mistake impossible. Said Kelly Johnson in a history of the Oxcart program, "It was perfectly evident from movies taken of the takeoff, and from the pilot's description, that there were some miswired gyros in the aircraft. This turned out to be exactly what happened. In spite of color coding and every other normal precaution, the pitch and yaw gyro connections were interchanged in rigging."

• 1961 – First RCAF Bomarc missile unit, No. 446 (SAM) Squadron, was formed at North Bay, Ontario.

• 1948 – Minister of National Defense, Brooke Claxton, outlined an expanded defense program which included an increase in personnel, reconditioning of air stations and development and production of jet fighters.

• 1948 – In the 1948 Airborne Transport DC-3 (DST) disappearance, NC16002 disappears without a trace off the coast of Florida with 32 on board.

• 1945 – First flight of the Edo XOSE-1, prototype of the Edo OSE

• 1943 – American aircraft based at Tarawa strike Nauru.

• 1938 – First flight of the Blackburn Botha

• 1936 – Deutsche Werke lays the keel of Germany’s first aircraft carrier, designated Carrier A, at Kiel. Later renamed Graf Zeppelin, she will never be completed.

• 1934 – During the Chaco War, a Macchi M.18 flying boat of the Paraguayan Navy’s aviation arm carries out the first night bombing raid in South America, attacking Bolivian positions at Vitriones and Mbutum.

• 1929 – First flight of the Mitsubishi B2M

• 1926 – Imperial Airways begins England-India mail and passenger service.

• 1921 – Second Lieutenant Samuel Howard Davis (1896–1921) is killed in the crash of Curtiss JN-6HG-1 (possibly USAAS serial 44796, seen wrecked at Carlstrom AAF, date unknown).

• 1916 – Imperial German Navy Zeppelin LZ69 L 24, crashed into a wall while being "stabled", broke its back, and burned out together with L 17, LZ53.

• 1910 – French aviator Alexandre Laffont and Spanish passenger Mario Pola are killed at Issy-Les-Molineaux shortly after taking off in an attempt to fly to Belgium with two passengers. Their Antoinette monoplane collapses in midair.

December 29

• 2012 – Red Wings Airlines Flight 9268, Tupolev Tu-204-100B RA-64047, arriving from Pardubice AirportatPardubice in the Czech Republic at the end of a repositioning flight with a crew of eight and no passengers on board, overruns the runway on landing at Vnukovo International AirportinMoscow, Russia, crosses partly onto a highway, crashes into a ditch, breaks into three pieces, and catches fire, killing five crew members and critically injuring all three survivors.^[1][2]

• 2012 – Syrian Air cancels a flight to Aleppo, Syria, because of fighting between giverment and rebel forces near Aleppo International Airport. ^[3]

• 2012 – An airstrike, suspected of being by an American unmanned aerial vehicle, destroys a Toyota Land Cruiser outside Rada'a in southern Yemen, killing three al-Qaeda members in the vehicle and prompting dozens of al-Qaeda members to protest.^[4]

• 2004 – An American Special Forces MC-130H Hercules (c/n 382-5054, 16th SOW, 15th SOS) is written off while landing on Q-West airfield near Mosul, Iraq, though no one was hurt. The pilot was unaware a large pit had been dug in the runway.^[5]

• 1994 – Turkish Airlines Flight 278, a Boeing 737-4Y0, crashes during its final approach to land at Van Ferit Melen Airport in eastern Turkey in driving snow. Five of the seven crew and 52 of the 69 passengers are killed.

• 1991 – China Airlines Flight 358, a Boeing 747-200F, suffers double engine separation and crashes into a hill near Wanli, Taipei, Taiwan, killing all 5 crew on board.

• 1986 – First flight of the Scaled Composites ATTT.

• 1982 – An Indian Air Force helicopter crashed near Gantok, five killed.

• 1980 – A U.S. Navy pilot ejects from stricken Douglas TA-4J Skyhawk, BuNo. 154626, 'JH', of VC-10, on flight from NAS Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after engine failure and fire, spends 30 hours in the water before rescue shortly after midnight on Wednesday, 31 December, from the Atlantic ~45 miles (72 km) S of Bahamian island of Mayaguana by a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter. Two Skyhawks departed Gitmo on routine training mission at 1500 hrs. on Monday, second pilot sees pilot Cmdr. Frank Riordan successfully eject from burning fighter with a good canopy ~240 miles NE of Guantanamo. Observer aboard U.S. Navy P-3 Orion out of NAS Jacksonville, Florida, spots strobelight on pilot's life jacket on Tuesday night, 28 December. Riordan recovered in good condition "except for a slight case of exposure", said a Coast Guard spokesman in Miami, Florida.

• 1978 – Freddie To makes the first flight of a solar-powered aircraft, the Solar One (airplane)|Solar One

• 1975 - At 6:33 p.m. EST, a bomb with the equivalent force of 25 sticks of dynamite exploded in the main terminal at LaGuardia Airport in New York, New York, killing 11 and injuring 75. The victims included travelers, limousine drivers, and airline employees.

• 1974 – A Tarom Antonov AN-24 (registered YR-AMD) flying from Bucharest to Sibiu, crashes into the side of the Lotrului Mountains, killing all 28 passengers and 5 crew members. The crash is blamed on the crew incorrectly executing the approach, which led to the aircraft drifting off course by 20 km in turbulent conditions.

• 1972 – Eastern Air Lines Flight 401, a Lockheed Tristar, crashes in the Florida Everglades, killing 103 of 176 people on board; the crew is distracted by a faulty gear-down light, resulting in controlled flight into terrain; this is the first crash of a widebody aircraft and the first loss of a Lockheed Tristar.

• 1951 – Continental Charters Flight 44-2, a Curtiss-Wright C-46, crashes into a ridge near Napoli, New York while en route to Buffalo, New York; 3 crew members and 23 passengers die

• 1949 – Entered Service: Lockheed F-94 Starfire with the United States Air Force

• 1948 – First flight of the Supermarine Swift

• 1944 – F/L RJ Audet, flying a Supermarine Spitfire of No. 411 (Fighter) Squadron near Rheine, Germany, destroyed five enemy fighters in his first combat.

• 1943 – 1st Lt Robert L. Duke is killed in the crash of Curtiss A-25A-20-CS Shrike, 42-79823, near Spencer, Tennessee, this date. He was assigned as Assistant A-3 of Eglin Field. Eglin Auxiliary Field 3 is later named Duke Field in his honor.

• 1940 – 29-30 – The Luftwaffe makes a devastating attack on London, making extensive use of incendiary weapons.

• 1939 – First flight of the Consolidated B-24 Liberator

• 1938 – (29-31) A German Arado Ar 79 training and touring aircraft sets an international long-distance record for an aircraft of its class, flying 6,303 kilometres (3,917 mi) from Benghazi, Libya, to Gaya, India, nonstop at an average speed of 160 kilometres per hour (99 mph).

• 1937 – A Spanish Nationalist counteroffensive against Republican forces during the Battle of Teruel begins with the support of German aircraft of the Condor Legion. The Condor Legion has had to redeploy in order to support the counteroffensive, and its personnel are becoming weary of the constant changes of front required by Nationalist military operations.

• 1936 – Compañía Aeronáutica Uruguaya S. A. (CAUSA) founded by the Uruguayan banker Luis J. Supervielle and Coronel Tydeo Larre Borges. Its initial fleet is two Junkers Ju 52 floatplanes, which begin service between Montevideo, Uruguay, and Buenos Aires, Argentina.

• 1933 – The Imperial Airways Avro Ten Apollo (G-ABLU) strikes a radio mast and crashes at Ruysselede, Belgium, killing all 10 people on board. King Albert I of Belgium will award Camille van Hove, who is hospitalized with serious burns suffered while trying to rescue victims from the airliner’s wreckage, the Civic Cross (1st Class).

• 1931 – First flight of the Grumman FF

• 1927 – Georg Wulf, co-founded of Focke-Wulf is killed in the crash of the Focke-Wulf Fw 19

• 1921 – Edward Stinson and Lloyd Bertaud set a world endurance record of 26 hours, 18 min and 35 seconds flying a BMW-engined Junkers-Larsen over Roosevelt Field.

• 1916 – Imperial German Navy Zeppelin LZ84 L 38, damaged beyond repair in a forced landing (due to heavy snowfall) during an attempted raid on Reval and Saint Petersburg.

{{#ifexpr:31>29

 |December 1

• 2012 – Syrian rebels credit one rebel soldier trained in the use of 9K38 Igla (NATO reporting name "SA-16 Gimlet") surface-to-air missiles captured from the Syrian government with using the missiles to shoot down two Syrian Army helicopters on consecutive days.^[1]

• 2011 – A Central Intelligence Agency RQ-170 Sentinel unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) on a reconnaissance mission malfunctions, veers out of control, and flies deep into Iran, where it runs out of fuel and crashes.^[2]

• 2006 – Air Berlin orders 60 Boeing 737 with delivery scheduled for November 2007.

• 2006 – CR Airways based in Hong Kong changes its name to Hong Kong Airlines.

• 2001 – Captain Bill Compton brings Trans World Airlines Flight 220, an MD-83, into St. Louis International Airport bringing to an end 76 years of TWA operations following TWA’s purchase by American Airlines.

• 2001 – Armed Forces of the Russian Federation Flight 9064: A Russian military Ilyushin Il-76TD catches fire and crashes near Novaya Inya, Russia killing all 18 on board.

• 1995 – First flight of the Air Tractor AT-602

• 1993 – Northwest Airlink Flight 5719, a Jetstream 31, crashes into two ridges east of Hibbing, Minnesota, killing all 18 on board.

• 1989 – A leased CASA 212-300 Aviocar, 88-320, N296CA, c/n 296, operated by the US Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM) for testing duties, crashes at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland. The crew had been conducting tests of tracking equipment during the short flight from Davison AAF at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Aircraft crashed and sank into the water ~ 50 yards off shore, in 45 feet water, reportedly because the flight crew inadvertently selected "beta range" on the propellers at 800 feet, stalled and crashed into the river. Pilot CW4 Gaylord M. Bishop, copilot CW4 Howard E. Morton, SPC Peter Rivera-Santos, PFC Mark C. Elkins, and CIV Ronald N. Whiteley Jr. KWF.

• 1984 – Intentional crash of Boeing 720 in the NASA Controlled Impact Demonstration program at Edwards AFB.

• 1981 – Inex-Adria Aviopromet Flight 1308, a McDonnell Douglas MD-81, crashes in the mountains while approaching Campo dell'Oro Airport in Ajaccio, Corsica, killing all 180 on board.

• 1977 – First flight of the Lockheed Have Blue

• 1976 – First flight of the Ahrens AR 404 N404AR

• 1974 – The Harriman State Park plane crash was a fatal crash of a Boeing 727 which took place near Stony Point, New York. The flight, designated Northwest Airlines Flight 6231, had been chartered to pick up the Baltimore Colts football team in Buffalo, New York. All three crew members aboard were killed when the aircraft struck the ground following a stall and rapid descent caused by the crew’s reaction to erroneous airspeed readings caused by atmospheric icing. The icing occurred due to failure to turn on pitot heat at the beginning of the flight.

• 1974 – TWA Flight 514, a Boeing 727 inbound to Dulles International Airport, crashes into Mount Weather in Bluemont, Virginia, killing all 85 passengers and 7 crew.

• 1970 – First flight of the Dassault Falcon 10

• 1969 – The first legislation to limit aircraft noise levels at airports is introduced in U. S. Federal Air Regulation, Part 36.

• 1952 – A USAF Douglas C-47B-50-DK Skytrain, 45-1124, crashes in the San Bernardino Mountains with 13 aboard "during a lashing storm while ferrying personnel from its home base, Offutt Air Force Base, Omaha, Nebraska to March Air Force Base near here." Search parties fly out of Norton Air Force Base, San Bernardino, California, and search snow-covered 8,000-foot (2,400 m) level near Big Bear Lake, where a sheriff's deputy reported seeing a fire on Monday night. The aircraft was last heard from at 2151 hrs. PST. Wreck found at ~11,400-foot (3,500 m) level of Mount San Gorgonio. All 13 killed while flying (KWF).

• 1951 – F/O Bruce Gogerly of 77 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), flying a Gloster Meteor, declared victory over Soviet-piloted MiG-15, but all MiGs returned to base. [2]

• 1950 – The United States Air Force removes the Tactical Air Command from the control of the Continental Air Command. The Tactical Air Command returns to the status of a major command for the first time since December 1948.

• 1948 – The United States Air Force creates the Continental Air Command and subordinates the Air Defense Command and the Tactical Air Command to it.

• 1945 – Avro Canada Ltd was formed and took over the facilities of Victory Aircraft Ltd at Malton, Ontario. They began with about 400 key personnel who had been kept on from the wartime production programme.

• 1944 – No. 2 Air Command, established at Winnipeg, took over duties of Nos. 2 and 4 Training Commands disbanded on 30 November.

• 1943 – The United States reopens the former Japanese airfield on Betio at Tarawa Atoll as Hawkins Field for use by fighters. In mid-December, it will begin to handle heavy bombers as well.

• 1941 – The Civil Air Patrol is created by Fiorello La Guardia, Mayor of New York City and Director of the Office of Civilian Defense, with the signing of Administrative Order 9.

• 1938 – Non-Permanent Active Air Force was renamed the Auxiliary Active Air Force.

• 1935 – The first airway traffic control center is opened in Newark, N. J., operated by staff of Eastern Air Lines, United Air Lines, American Airlines and TWA.

• 1933 – Indian National Airways commences the first daily service in India, between Calcutta and Dacca.

• 1932 – First flight of the Heinkel He 70

• 1932 – First flight of the Bernard 200

• 1932 – Pan American World Airways announces plans to offer service to Hawaii.

• 1925 – The Boeing Airplane Co. delivers the first of 10 FB-1 s to the Navy. This one-seat land biplane is the Navy version of the Army PW-9 fighter. The last will be delivered Dec. 22.

• 1919 – The Wright-Martin Corporation changes its name to Wright Aeronautical Corporation.

• 1915 – The United States Army’s 2d Aero Squadron is formed.

• 1911 – Royal Navy Lieutenant Arthur Longmore lands a float-equipped Short Improved S.27 in the River Medway, becoming the first person in the United Kingdom to take off from land and make a successful water landing.

• 1910 – The Curtiss Aeroplane Company is founded.

• 1783 – Charles and his assistant Robert make the first flight in a hydrogen-filled balloon (Charliere). On his second flight, Charles reached an altitude of 2,700 metres (8,900 ft) over Vivarais. They travel from Paris to Nesles, a distance of 43 km (27 mi).

December 31

• 2012 – EasySky Flight 735,While attempting to land at San Pedro Sula Airport, the aircraft veered off the runway and ran into a ditch about 130 feet off the runway before coming to a stop. There were no serious injuries among the crew of 2 and 17 passengers. The captain received minor injuries. The crew reported a problem with the brakes during roll out just before the aircraft veered off the runway.^[1]

• 2012 – The Kachin Independence Army again claims to be under attack by Myanmar Air Force aircraft.^[2]

• 2012 – Aleppo International Airport is closed due to fighting between Syrian government and rebel forces around the base of the Syrian Army force protecting the airport.^[3]

• 1999 – Fear of the Y2 K computer bug and possible in-flight consequences for those planes flying during the night of December 31, 1999 and the early morning of January 1, 2000, spreads around the airline industry.

• 1989 – First flight of the Sukhoi Su-30

• 1985 – Singer-songwriter and actor Ricky Nelson and six others die in the crash of a Douglas DC-3 near DeKalb, Texas.

• 1972 – Baseball player Roberto Clemente dies when his chartered DC-7 crashes into the ocean off the coast of Isla Verde, Puerto Rico, immediately after takeoff. Clemente was attempting to deliver relief supplies to Managua, Nicaragua, after a massive earthquake on December 23.

• 1970 – Jeanne Holm becomes the USAF's first female General

• 1968 – First flight of the Tupolev Tu-144

• 1968 – MacRobertson Miller Airlines Flight 1750, a Vickers Viscount, crashes in Australia, killing all 26 people on board.

• 1967 – The Royal Air Force's V-bomber force begins to be dismantled, pending the deployment of the Polaris missile aboard Royal Navy submarines to act as Britain's nuclear deterrent.

• 1967 – NASA begins initial talks to develop guidelines for a re-usable space plane.

• 1958 – First flight of the Boeing C-137 Stratoliner

• 1956 – A United States Air Force Lockheed C-121C, 54-165, crashed on approach to Dhahran, Saudi Arabia while flying UN troops into the Suez Canal zone. It was also carrying Hungarian refugees back to Charleston AFB, South Carolina. 12 of 38 onboard killed.[citation needed]

• 1951 – The year-end tally showed that for the first time, total passenger flying miles exceeded that of railroad miles at 10.6 million.

• 1944 – Entered Service: Grumman F8F Bearcat with the United States Navy

• 1944 – University Air Training Squadrons were disbanded.

• 1943 – Japanese Rabaul-based aircraft raid U. S. forces off Arawe, losing four aircraft.

• 1943 – Since mid-December, when they began staging through Tarawa Atoll, U. S. Army Air Forces B-24 Liberators have dropped 601 tons (545,227 kg) of bombs on the Marshall Islands.

• 1943 – Kawanishi N1K2-J Shiden Kai (“Violet Lightning Modified”), Allied reporting name “George”

• 1942 – (Overnight) Guided by an Oboe-equipped Mosquito, eight Pathfinder Force Avro Lancasters bomb on sky markers suspended by parachute for the first time in a raid on Düsseldorf. Bomber Command previously had employed only ground markers, and the new capability allows British bombers to bomb through ten-tenths cloud cover.

• 1942 – During 1942, the U. S. Army Air Forces' Eleventh Air Force has destroyed at least 50 Japanese aircraft in the Aleutian Islands campaign in exchange for the loss of 12 aircraft in combat and almost 80 to other causes. Japanese non-combat aircraft losses in the Aleutian Islands have been equally high. Since October 1, Eleventh Air Force aircraft have dropped 500,000 pounds (230,000 kg) of bombs on Japanese bases in the Aleutians.

• 1940 – A Vickers Wellington IA bomber, N2980, R for Robert, of No. 20 OTU, out of RAF Lossiemouth, suffers starboard engine failure at 8,000 feet in a snow storm whilst on a training flight over Great Glen, Scotland. Pilot, Squadron Leader Marlwood-Elton orders crew of six trainee navigators and the tail gunner to bail-out, all escaping safely save the gunner whose chute fails to open. Marlwood-Elton and P/O Slatter (also reported as Slater) then notice a body of water and they successfully ditch in the northern basin of Loch Ness near the A82 road, both escaping before the airframe sinks. Discovered by side-scan sonar in 1976, the rare Wellington is raised on 21 September 1985, and restored at Weybridge where she was built. Now on display at the Brooklands Museum, it is one of only two known intact Wellingtons.

• 1922 – The first German aircraft flies over Britain since the end of World War I, a Deutsche Luft-Reederei Dornier Komet

• 1908 – Wilbur Wright wins a prize of FF 20,000 from Michelin for the longest flight of the year – 124 kilometres (77 mi) from Camp d'Auvours.