Award of the Harmon Trophy begins. A set of three trophies is awarded annually to the world's outstanding aviator, aviatrix (female aviator), and aeronaut (balloonordirigible aviator) for the year, and a fourth trophy (the National Trophy) is awarded to the outstanding aviator for the year in each of the 21 member countries of the International League of Aviators.
Summer 1926 – A Lieutenant Jira of Czechoslovakia flies Avia B.9.11L-BONG 1,800 km (1,100 mi) from PraguetoParis and back at an average speed of 131.2 km/h (81.5 mph), a notable achievement at the time for an aircraft of the B.9's class.[3]
January 26 – Ramón Franco and his crew complete the second leg of their Spain-to-Buenos Aires flight, flying 1,081 miles (1,740 km) from Las Palmas in the Canary Islands to Porto Praia in the Cape Verde Islands in 9 hours 50 minutes.[5]
January 30 – Ramón Franco and his crew complete the third and longest leg of their Spain-to-Buenos Aires flight, flying 1,429 miles (2,300 km) from Barrera de Inferno in the Cape Verde Islands to Fernando de Noronha in 12 hours at an altitude of 1,000 feet (300 meters). It is the second-longest nonstop flight in history – exceeded only by a 1,890-mile North Atlantic Ocean crossing in a Vickers Vimyon14-15 June 1919byJohn Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown – and they become the first aviators to cross the South Atlantic Ocean using only one aircraft. Rough weather forces them to spend the night on their flying boat Plus Ultra before they can dock at Fernando de Noronha.[5]
January 31 – Forced to throw their gear and luggage overboard to remain airborne after an in-flight engine failure, Ramón Franco and his crew complete the fourth leg of their Spain-to-Buenos Aires flight, flying 335 miles (539 km) from Fernando de Noronha to Recife, Brazil, where they receive a hero's welcome.[6]
February 9 – Ramón Franco and his crew complete the sixth leg of their Spain-to-Buenos Aires flight, flying 1,277 miles (2,055 km) from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Montevideo, Uruguay, in 12 hours 5 minutes.[7]
February 10 – Ramón Franco and his crew complete their Spain-to-Buenos Aires flight, flying the journey's seventh leg, a 136-mile (219 km) flight from Montevideo, Uruguay, to Buenos Aires where they receive another welcome by exuberant crowds. Over 20 days, they have completed the 6,300-mile (10,145-km) trip from Spain in just under 51 hours of flying time, a considerable achievement for the time. Franco's plans to fly back to Spain in Plus Ultra via Chile, Mexico, Cuba, and the Azores will be cancelled when the Government of Spain opts to present the plane to the Government of Argentina as a gift. Plus Ultra's crew instead will return to Spain aboard the Argentine Navyprotected cruiserBuenos Aires as Spanish national heroes.[7]
April 30 – Bessie Coleman, the first licensed African-American female pilot, is killed along with mechanic William Wills, who was piloting the plane, after they crash as a result of a wrench that Wills accidentally left loose getting stuck in the control gears.[12]
May 6 – Flying a Blackburn Dart, Flight Lieutenant Gerald Boyce makes the first night deck landing in history, landing aboard the British aircraft carrier HMS Furious off the south coast of England.[14]
May 20 – The Air Commerce Act becomes law in the United States. It creates an Aeronautics Branch within the United States Department of Commerce, vesting that entity with regulatory powers to ensure civil air safety, including testing and licensing pilots, issuing certificates to guarantee the airworthiness of aircraft, making and enforcing safety rules, certifying aircraft, establishing airways, operating and maintaining aids to air navigation, and investigating accidents and incidents in aviation.[citation needed] It also directs that airways in the United States be charted for the first time, and assigns the responsibility to chart them to the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey.[15]
June 26 – Flying a Potez 28, Ludovic Arrachart and his brother Paul depart Paris. By the time a broken fuel pipe forces them to land at RAF Shaibah near Basra, Iraq, 26 hours 30 minutes later, they will have set a new world aviation nonstop distance record of 4,313 km (2,680 mi).
June 30 – Alan Cobham sets out on a round trip from England to Australia in a de Havilland DH.50. He will arrive back in London on October 1 and receive a knighthood for his accomplishment.
In accordance with the redesignation of its parent service, the Air Service Tactical School at Langley Field in Virginia is renamed the Air Corps Tactical School.
July 26 – During United States Navy experiments with the operation of seaplanes from a submarine equipped with an aircraft hangar, the submarine USS S-1 (SS-105) carries out for the first time a full cycle of surfacing, removing the disassembled seaplane from its hangar, assembling it, launching it, retrieving it, disassembling it, stowing in its hangar, and submerging, on the Thames RiveratNew London, Connecticut.
October 28 – The French aviators Dieudonné Costes and J. Rignot break the world distance record, flying 5,396 km (3,353 mi) from Paris to Jask, Persia, as a part of 19,625 km (12,194 mi) Paris–India–Paris flight.
November 15 – T. Neville Stack and B. S. Leete leave England in an attempt to reach India by air in a de Havilland DH.60. They will arrive in Karachi on January 8, 1927.
November 17 – Mario de Bernardi breaks his four-day-old world speed record, reaching 416.618 km/h (258.874 mph) in the same Macchi M.39 at Hampton Roads, Virginia, USA.
December 22 – Bert Hinkler and John F. Leeming, flying an Avro 585 Gosport biplane G-EBPH, successfully land on and take off from the summit of Helvellyn in England.
^Peattie, Mark R., Sunburst: The Rise of Japanese Naval Air Power 1909-1941, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2001, ISBN978-1-55750-432-6, p. 39.
^Smith, Peter C., Dive Bomber!, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1982, ISBN978-0-87021-930-6, pp. 23-24.
^Gooch, John, Mussolini and His Generals: The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy, 1922-1940, Cambridge, U.K: Cambridge University Press, 2007, ISBN978-0-521-85602-7, p. 75.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN978-0-7607-0592-6, p. 63.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, ISBN978-0-517-56588-9, p. 462.
^Polmar, Norman, "'There's a Ford In Your Future'," Naval History, December 2015, p. 14.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 74.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN0-7607-0592-5, p. 187.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN0-7607-0592-5, p. 63.
Taylor, H.A. Fairey Aircraft since 1915. London:Putnam, 1988. ISBN978-0-370-00065-7.
