Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/November 8

November 8

• 2009 – An OH-58 Kiowa experiences a hard landing north of Baghdad in the Salah ad Din Province. Two U.S. Army pilots are killed. They were assigned to the 2nd Squadron, 6th Cavalry Regiment, 25th Combat Aviation Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, Schofield Barracks.

• 1998 – Lockheed S-3B Viking, BuNo 159733, of VS-22 lands on the deck of the USS Enterprise at 1918 hrs. during night landing requalifications off of the Virginia coast. At 1920 hrs. an EA-6B ICAP II Block 86 Prowler, BuNo 163885, of VAQ-130 receives a wave-off due to the deck still being fouled, but its starboard wing strikes the Viking.1] The Prowler continues over the side as all four crew eject, as well as two crew from the S-3. The Viking crew are recovered, but the Prowler crew are all casualties with only one body recovered. Deck fire is brought under control in seven minutes. The damaged S-3B is also jettisoned.

• 1989 – A KC-10A Extender tanker aircraft refuels a Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit bomber for the B-2's first aerial refueling.

• 1984 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-51-A at 12:15:00 UTC. Mission highlights: Multiple comsat deployments, retrieval of two other comsats Palapa B2 and Westar VI which were subsequently refurbished on Earth and reflown.

• 1983 – A TAAG Angola Airlines Boeing 737 is shot down just after takeoff from Lubango Airport; all 130 on board die.

• 1982 – A United States Air Force in Europe F-4 crashed near Hannover, West Germany, both crew killed.

• 1978 – First flight of the Bombardier Challenger 600 took off at Montreal – Two years after the go-ahead decision. With Canadair‘s chief test pilot, F.D. Adkins, at the controls, it was airborne for 50 min with the undercarriage down and the flaps slightly extended.

• 1967 – (overnight) – Shot down by Viet Cong ground fire in an HH-3E helicopter and badly burned during a rescue mission southeast of Khe Sanh, South Vietnam, U.S. Air Force Captain Gerald O. Young deliberately draws attention to himself, then evades the enemy on the ground for hours to lead enemy forces away from other Americans on the ground and additional helicopters coming to rescue them. He will receive the Medal of Honor for his actions.

• 1965 – American Airlines Flight 383, a Boeing 727, crashes while on approach to Greater Cincinnati airport; of the 62 people on board, one flight attendant and three passengers survive.

• 1963 – Aero O/Y aircraft OH-LCA, Aero Flight 217, crashes before landing in poor visibility at Mariehamn Airport on the Åland Islands, killing 22 out of 25 passengers.

• 1961 – Imperial Airlines Flight 201/8, a Lockheed Constellation L-049, crashes on landing at Byrd Field near Richmond, Virginia; all 74 passengers—mostly new US Army recruits being flown to their base for training—die of carbon monoxide asphyxiation, along with three crew members; the captain and flight engineer survive by escaping the burning wreckage.

• 1957 – Pan Am Flight 7, a Boeing 377 Stratocruiser, disappears between San Francisco and Honolulu; small pieces of wreckage and human remains are found almost a week later by the U.S. Navy; all 44 on board are believed to have been killed; carbon monoxide poisoning is a suspected cause of the crash.

• 1954 – Royal Air Force Air Commodore Geoffrey D. Stephenson, former commandant of the Royal Air Force Central Fighter Establishment, is killed in the crash of a USAF North American F-100A-10-NA Super Sabre, 53-1534, c/n 192-29, near Auxiliary Field 2 of Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. Commodore Stephenson, on a tour of the U.S., is flying at 13,000 feet (4,000 m) as he joins formation with another F-100 when his fighter drops into a steep spiral, impacting at ~1414 hrs. in a pine forest on the Eglin Reservation, one mile (1.6 km) NE of the runway of Pierce Field, Auxiliary Fld. 2.

• 1953 – Eight U.S. Marine Corps pilots avoid disaster when their fighters run low on fuel during a flight from Puerto Rico to a Marine Corps base near Miami, Florida. Three pilots, Capt. William H. Johnson, of Miami, Lt. Thomas D. White, of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and Lt. Forest G. Dawson, of Tucson, Arizona, are forced to ditch in the ocean due to fuel exhaustion but are rescued by nearby ships in a short time. Five other planes are forced down at Homestead AFB, Florida, S of Miami, where one, flown by Capt. Donald Edwards, of Opa-Locka, Florida, overshoots the field, ending up in a canal.

• 1950 – 1Lt. Russell Brown shoots down a MiG-15 from his F-80 Shooting Star, the first victory USAF over soviet MiG-15.

• 1943 – A morning strike by 97 Japanese dive bombers and fighters and a few torpedo bombers damages a U.S. attack transport off Bouganiville. An evening strike by 30 or 40 aircraft damages the light cruiser USS Birmingham(CL-62).

• 1943 – Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress 42-3553 "Sad Sack" crashed at Middle Farm, West Harling, Norfolk, United Kingdom shortly after taking off from RAF Snetterton Heath with the loss of all ten crew.

• 1942 – Pilots equipped with anti-G suits carried out combat operations for the first time in history. They were members of 807 Squadron Fleet Air Arm, wearing the Canadian designed Franks suit. They flew Supermarine Seafires over Oran, Algeria.

• 1942 – Operation Torch – the Allied amphibious landings in French North Africa – take place, supported by the British aircraft carriers HMS Victorious, HMS Formidable, HMS Argus, HMS Avenger, HMS Biter, and HMS Dasher with 160 aircraft and the American carriers USS Ranger (CV-4), USS Sangamon (ACV-26), USS Suwannee (ACV-27), USS Chenango (ACV-28), and USS Santee (ACV-29) with 136 aircraft. French aircraft resist the landings, strafing the landing beaches at least five times, and aerial combat occurs between U.S. Navy F4F Wildcats and French Dewoitine D.520 and Curtiss Hawk 75A fighters during the Naval Battle of Casablanca that day. U.S. Navy aircraft bomb and strafe French ships, helping to sink or wreck the light cruiser Primauguet, a destroyer leader, and two destroyers. Off Algiers, 21 German Junkers Ju 88s and Heinkel He 111s attack Allied ships, fatally damaging the transport USS Leedstown (AP-73) and damaging other ships.

• 1938 – Col. Leslie MacDill, commissioned in the Coast Artillery in 1912, became a military pilot in 1914, and commanded an aerial gunnery school in St. Jean de Monte, France in World War I, is killed this date in the crash of his North American BC-1, 37-670, of the 1st Staff Squadron, at 1807 13th Street, SE, Anacostia, Washington, D.C. after take-off from Bolling Field. Southeast Air Base, Tampa, Florida, is renamed MacDill Field on 1 December 1939.

• 1936 – (8-23) Soviet aircraft play an important role in the Republican defense of Madrid.

• 1935 – Kingsford Smith and Pethybridge were flying the Lady Southern Cross overnight from Allahabad, India, to Singapore, while attempting to break the England-Australia speed record, when they disappeared over the Andaman Sea in the early hours. 18 months later, Burmese fishermen found an undercarriage leg and wheel (with its tyre still inflated) which had been washed ashore at Aye Island in the Gulf of Martaban, 3 km (2 mi) off the southeast coastline of Burma, some 137 km (85 mi) south of Mottama (formerly known as Martaban). Lockheed confirmed the undercarriage leg to be from the Lady Southern Cross. Botanists who examined the weeds clinging to the undercarriage leg estimated that the aircraft itself lies not far from the island at a depth of approximately 15 fathoms (90 ft; 27 m). The undercarriage leg is now on public display at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, Australia.

• 1916 – Lieutenant Clarence K. Bronson, Naval Aviator No. 15, and Lt. Luther Welsh, on an experimental bomb test flight at Naval Proving Ground, Indian Head, Maryland, were instantly killed by the premature explosion of a bomb in their plane.

• 1881 – Robert Estnault-Pelterie, early aviation pioneer is born. He invented ailerons and coined the word astronautics.