Modern Airplane Technology: 1950-1999
Overview
From the moment Orville and Wilbur Wright (1871-1948 and 1867-1912, respectively) took their famous flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, the world fell in love with the idea of the airplane. But man's fascination with flight goes back even further. As early as ancient Greece, people gazed in wonder at birds' flight, wishing they too could reach those soaring heights. Of course, for the mythological figure Icarus thatwish turned fatal when he flew too high and too close to the sun; the wings his father had created out of feathers and wax melted, sending him crashing to his death.
Background
Many times throughout history, man has tried to copy birds' flight and failed. Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) sketched flying machines in the 1500s and even made some models. The first successful flights, however, were not taken until the early 1780s, and they were not in flying machines but in hot-air balloons. In the late 1850s balloons were enhanced with steam engines to create airships.
In the 1800s the aeronautical pioneer Sir George Cayley (1773-1857) solved many of the technological questions that airplane flight posed. In 1853 his glider was the first aircraft to take a man into the air.
This page contains 201 words.
Modern Airplane Technology: 1950-1999 article
Read the rest of this article.
This article contains 1,525 words
(approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page).
Order our Fixed-wing aircraft Article
