Recently in Historical Category

In a dimmed hangar on the side of Charlotte-Douglas International Airport lies N106US, the US Airways Airbus A320 that landed on the Hudson River one chilly January morning in 2009.

Edward Russell

The famous "Miracle on the Hudson" aircraft is now an exhibit at the Carolinas Aviation Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina. Flight 1549 was bound for Charlotte after departing New York's LaGuardia airport on the morning of 15 January 2009 before its fateful meeting with a flock of Canadian geese over New York.

While solemn in its presentation, the exhibit celebrates all of the factors that combined to allow for a successful ditching in the Hudson with no loss of life. Elements highlighted range from the experience of the crew and aircraft avionics to the fact that the A320 was one of only a handful in US Airways' fleet with extended overwater certification, which requires life vests and rafts for every passenger. One interesting fact that stood out - less than a third of the passengers on the aircraft had reviewed the safety card before the flight.

Edward Russell

N106US ended up at the museum after its president Shawn Dorsch was inspired by a visit to a memorial to JAL Flight 123 at the Japan Airlines' Safety Promotion Centre near Haneda Airport in Japan, which had a flow chart of safety improvements since the 1985 accident and ending at US Airways 1549.

"When I saw this, I realised that 1549 was an international aviation icon," Dorsch told Flightglobal in 2011. "For me, having it in the museum would give the opportunity to tell something much bigger than the event itself."

Edward Russell

Next time you're passing through Charlotte and have a few hours, the museum is a highly recommended diversion only a few minutes drive from the terminal.

 

Why not head down to Tucson, Arizona, to see the latest exhibition in the Boneyard Project later this month?

Artists have used abandoned aircraft from the US Air Force to create works of art from the "eccentric shapes" from the metal.

Later this month (January 28) until May 31 you can see what the artists have created at the Pima Air and Space Museum in the Round Trip: Art From The Boneyard Project exhibition.

many of the artists have used nose art, made popular during the Second World War, and one graffiti artist, Nunca, has brought an abandoned DC-3 to life with a striking picture of an eagle.

The first part of the Boneyard Project, Nose Job, made its debut last summer of 2011 with an
exhibition of nose cones taken from military aircraft and given to artists to use "canvases" at Eric Firestone Gallery in East Hampton, Long Island.

In a release about the upcoming exhibition, it says that "Nose Job enjoyed critical success as the work tapped into both the broader cultural resonance of this history, and the very personal ways one relates to such a narrative.

"Some artists investigated the streamlined symmetry of the forms themselves, producing
eloquent, elegant and even whimsical hybrids of sculpture and painting.

"Other artists addressed the positive and negative associations we each carry towards the difficult history of war, and many spoke more directly to their own individual relationships to this material including memories of parents who were air force or civilian pilots."

The second installment in the series: Round Trip: Selections from The Boneyard Project, will
include selections from the previous Nose Job exhibition along with more than a dozen cones
interpreted by artists new to this project. It will feature five monumental works created on
military aircraft by a dynamic selection of popular graffiti and street artists from around the world.

More than 30 artists took part in Round Trip using a number of disuased aircraft including DC-3, a C97 cockpit, a C45, and a Lockheed VC 140 Jetstar.

 

My colleague Stephen Trimble today blogged over on The Dew Line that Iran plans to reverse-engineer its very own Lockheed Martin RQ-170 from the example of the US stealth drone its forces apparently shot down earlier this month. As Stephen suggests, good luck to them.
Your correspondent back in October joined Boeing for a tour of European 787 suppliers, and was treated to a memorable presentation by Dassault Systemes chief executive Bernard Charles. Making the point that modern 3D digital design software has transformed our concept of reality, Charles observed that if Chinese counterfeiters were to buy a 787 and attempt to copy it, they would never succeed - but if they got ahold of the digital plans, they could do it.
That remark left one programme insider none too bemused; working from digital plans would clearly be miles better than trying to measure up all the parts with a pair of calipers, but still doesn't take into account the fact that the machine's measurements are only one aspect of its true essence, which arguably resides in its 18 million lines of computer code as much as its shape and size.
The incident brought to mind a real example of Chinese reverse engineering, which followed president Nixon's opening of the door to "Red China" back in 1972. One early goodwill gesture, Flight is told, was the sale to Beijing of three Boeing 727s. On a subsequent visit, Boeing legend Joe "father of the 747" Sutter was shown a fourth aircraft, which certainly looked like a 727.
But, on inspecting the machine, Sutter found such incongruities as a control yoke that would have taken the strength of three gorillas to move and urged the Chinese not to attempt a flight. Thankfully they heeded his advice.

Have you ventured out into the misty, cold and darkness and waded through the Autumn leaves to begin your Christmas shopping?

Flightglobal has a better idea. Why not stay at home and do your holiday shopping online?

This is especially appealing if you know certain friends or family members are excited by aircraft and things aviation. 

Look no further than the Flightglobal Image Store which houses a whole host of modern and vintage images placed in categories to make it easier to find what you're looking for:

Iconic Front Covers, Women In Aviation, World War II - 1939-45 Cutaways Pre 1914 1930s Civil 1930s Military, Post WWII, Experimental Prototypes, Air Races and Modern Aircraft Flight Collection

 

 

You can choose to have any of the images in a variety of formats from different canvas print sizes, turned into a jigsaw, have it emblazoned on a t-shirt, as a fridge magnet, mousemat or even a key ring, which would make super presents.

Take advantage of a 20% discount throughout the holiday season on the Flightglobal Image Store quoting discount code FGCD11 at checkout.

Happy shopping and happy holidays

 

 

To make a Boeing 787 requires 62 miles of wiring (that's a real Boeing-supplied fact) and enough carbon fibre to stretch to the Moon (I just made that up but it's probably not far off). Even more impressively, the aircraft's remarkable features - carbon composite structure, all-electric systems, big windows, higher cabin pressure, global supply chain and, alas, the hiccups and miscalculations that meant a three-and-a-half year delay in getting it into service - have inspired at least that many column inches in the press (maybe not enough to reach the Moon, but certainly as much as the wiring, which is still an awful lot).

As the aircraft finally enters service, it is interesting to ask which of its features will be most remarked on when time comes, say in 10 years' time, to write an article about "how the 787 has changed aviation".

My guess is that all those features, while impressive and most welcome (apart from the development delay), will have become quite normal (probably including the development delay). We will look back and identify the 787 as a milestone in aircraft design and construction, but aviation will not have changed so much - certainly not in the way it changed with the advent of the Boeing 747 jumbo jet, which shrank the world by makling long-haul travel a mass-market commodity.

What will prove significant about the 787 is that we, as passengers, will for the first time relate to an aircraft the way we relate to our personal computers, mobile phones and music players. Especially as its onboard entertainment and communication systems evolve and become more interactive and inter-linked to our personal devices, it will be the first aircraft that we start to think of not as a transportation vessel but as part of our lives.

The 787 is not, of course, the first or only airliner to offer 21st century in-flight entertainment and communications. But there is something particularly elegant about the way it integrates the latest construction technology with its flight controls and passenger experience. In that seamlessness, the 787 is to airliners as the Mac has been to personal computing. That is, the 787 just might be seen as the world's first airplane-sized personal electronic gadget.

 

The Chinook performed its first flight 50 years ago today and the rorotrcraft were introduced in 1962.

For more information on the remarkable rotorcraft see Flightglobal's profile and browse through the Flightglobal Image Store to buy images and cutaways of the aircraft.  

Helicopter Profile: Boeing CH-47 Chinook

Flightglobal Image Store - images and cutaways of the Chinook

The Chinook arrives (HC1s)

RAF Chinook - in service at last  

Commercial Chinook - What Boeing is offering

Chinook trial by ice

Chinook report criticises Boeing and authorities 

Boeing's Chinook page

 

 

It has been a decade since the terrorist attacks in America.

That decade wrought changes, including a new meaning of what it means to be an airline.

Perhaps surprisingly to anyone who recently went through airport security, its essence is a heightening of many of the same themes that gave aviation its attraction in the first place.

Ten years ago American Airlines made this clip of what it meant to be a post-9/11 airline.

Today, it is just as relevant.

 

Image credit AirTeamImages.com

BAe (British Aerospace) 146 performed its first flight on 3 Septmeber 1981 but the aircraft design is based on the Hawker Siddely HS 146 as described in an article in 1973. See also the cutaway drawing in the piece.

In the article BAe 146 described, published in the 2 May 1981 issue of Flight International, the aircraft would be able to fly 12-15 sectors a day. 165 miles in North America and 120 miles in Europe. It would chalk up 2,750 flying hours in a year and likely to be kept for 12-15 years before being sold.

BAe was asking for $10.5m for an 82-seat 146-100 and $11m for the 146-200. Read more about the benefits of the aircraft's design including the wing design and the benefits of its t-tail.

It had 100, 200 and -300 variations. The equivalent Avro RJ versions are designated RJ70, RJ85, and RJ100.

The RJ85 was the first RJ development of the BAe 146 family, features an improved cabin and used more efficient LF 507 engines. Deliveries of the RJ85 began in April 1993.

Flightglobal's Commercial Aircraft Directory noted that on "27 November 2001, BAE Systems announced the cancellation of the entire RJX programme, citing the poor sales prospects for the type in the aftermath of the "9/11" attacks in the USA. When the last Avro RJ off the Woodford production line was delivered to Air Botnia in November 2003, total Avro RJ production had reached 173, of which 87 were RJ85s."

In the archive: /.....BAe 146

BAE test RJ waters

Bae 146 described

Milestones

Cutaway BAe 146-200

Profile in commercial aircraft directory BAe 146-100 Flightglobal Image Store

http://www.flightglobalimages.com/dmcs_search.html?find=bae+146

BAe 146 on AirSpace

RJ85 on AirSpace

A nine-year-old has fascinated US war veterans and the public with his homemade website of the Bell UH-1 Iroquois nicknamed the Huey Helicopter.

Kevin Dutton's fascination began after a helicopter landed in his school four years ago.

Kevin began collecting its memorabilia and created the website as a school project which has gone on to prove immensely popular, and he has been overwhelmed with messages of praise.

One Vietnam veteran wrote: "Long after those of us who flew the Huey are gone, we will depend on young men like yourself to educate the public about the Huey."

It seems refreshing that a young boy wants to share his Huey fascination. Who knows what his future holds? When did your fascination for aviation begin.

Kevin Dutton's Huey website

Aircraft Profile: Bell UH-1 Huey

 In the archive

Bell aims to bring the Huey to a wider audience

The Huey's New Clothes

Originally called the Bell UH-1 Iroquois - How the Huey got its nickname

Letter: Please rescue historic Huey

Images 

Buy this image of a Huey from Flightglobal's Image Store

See this image by AirSpace user flyvertosset

This blog post was written by freelancer Rebecca Springate