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Aircraft

Topics


Amelia Earhart, pictured with the Lockheed Electra in which she disappeared in 1937.

Featured

What Happened to Amelia Earhart?

On the morning of July 2, 1937, Amelia Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, took off from Lae, New Guinea, on one of the last legs in their historic attempt to circumnavigate the globe. Their next destination was Howland Island in the central Pacific Ocean, some 2,500 miles away. A U.S. Coast Guard cutter, the […]

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Brigadier General James H. Doolittle leans out the window of his bomber plane and smiles. Undated photograph c 1943.

James H. Doolittle

Jimmy Doolittle: Early Years James Harold “Jimmy” Doolittle was born in Alameda, California, but spent much of his childhood in western Alaska. His father, Frank, was a gold prospector and carpenter in Nome, where young Jimmy learned to fight bullies and pilot a dogsled. Eventually Rosa and Jimmy Doolittle returned to California, leaving Frank behind. […]

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Charles Lindbergh (Photo by Library of Congress/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images)

Charles Lindbergh

Spirit of St. Louis Earlier pilots had crossed the Atlantic in stages, but most planes of the era weren’t equipped to carry enough fuel to make the trip without stopping to fuel up. Lindbergh decided, with the backing of several people in St. Louis, to compete for the Orteig Prize—a $25,000 reward put up by […]

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Stories


American aircraft designer Howard Hughes prepares for the trial run of his strategic airlift flying boat, the Hughes H-4 Hercules (aka the 'Spruce Goose'), Los Angeles harbor, 2nd November 1947. The brief flight was the aircraft's first and only time airborne.

Featured

7 Things You May Not Know About Howard Hughes

From the development of his massive Spruce Goose aircraft to his involvement in a top-secret CIA plot to recover a Soviet sub, get the facts about the eccentric billionaire.

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German fighter pilot Manfred Baron of Richthofen. Photography. around 1916.

6 Famous WWI Fighter Aces

The skies over World War I-era Europe served as a brutal testing ground for manned aircraft. Though limited by their primitive machines, these “Knights of the Sky” went on to achieve some of the war’s most extraordinary—and often downright suicidal—feats of heroism. Get the facts on six of the Great War’s most celebrated airborne daredevils.

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This Day in History

See All

2014

Malaysia Airlines flight vanishes with more than 200 people aboard

21st Century
1933

Wiley Post flies solo around the world

Exploration
1996

TWA Flight 800 explodes over Long Island

1990s
1977

Palestinians hijack German airliner

European History
1941

First Allied jet-propelled aircraft flies

World War II
1949

First commercial jet makes test flight

Inventions & Science
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