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The Transatlantic Adventures of Flying Fitz
“There’s a fish in the sky!” yelled an incredulous Antoine Letemplier. The 11-year-old son of the lighthouse keeper on ice-covered Greenly Island, Antoine had been at the kitchen window, watching the...
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Spitfire vs. Spitfire: Aerial Combat in Israel’s War of Independence
Israel’s War of Independence was punctuated by wild aerial engagements that underscored the conflict’s confusing nature. Around noon on January 7, 1949, two patrolling Israeli Air Force (IAF) pilots in...
View ArticleItaly’s Consummate Showman: Italo Balbo
Italo Balbo organized a series of spectacular mass formation “air cruises” that became synonymous with his name. On July 1, 1933, in a scene resembling a Jules Verne fantasy, 25 twin-hulled Savoia...
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An Around-the-World Flight ‘Foredoomed to Failure’
An ill-prepared British crew set out in 1922 on the first-ever attempt to fly around the world. In August 1922, the crew of a steam launch plucked two exhausted and half-starved British airmen from the...
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An ‘Outstanding American Citzen’
Italian immigrant Giuseppe Bellanca pioneered the cabin monoplane design, leading to a long line of record-breaking aircraft. On May 19, 1912, at Mineola Field, Long Island, gawkers and aviators alike...
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Flight of the Wellesleys
Early on November 5, 1938, three Vickers Wellesley bombers of the Royal Air Force’s Long Range Development Unit (LRDU) departed from Ismailia, Egypt, bound for Darwin, Australia, more than 7,000 miles...
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How a Forgotten South African Became the UK’s Top WWII Ace
South African pilot “Pat” Pattle’s star burned brightly over North Africa and Greece during his meteoric combat career. April 20, 1941: one week before Greece capitulated to German and Italian...
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Hunt for the Mad Mullah
The RAF played a pivotal role in the 1920 campaign against a dervish bandit leader in British Somaliland. For two decades prior to World War I, Mohammed bin Abdullah Hassan, the self-proclaimed Mullah...
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Meatboxes Versus Doodlebugs
Although Britain’s first operational jet never mixed it up with the Messerschmitt Me-262, the Gloster Meteor did take on a dangerous jet-powered opponent. The first two confrontations between the...
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The Remarkable Mrs. Markham
The small single-engine monoplane emerged from the Atlantic sky and, nearly out of fuel, flew low over the inhospitable, boulder-strewn Nova Scotian landscape. Desperately seeking a place to land and...
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Above the Roof of the World
Twenty years before Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first men to set foot on the 29,029-foot summit of Mount Everest on May 29, 1953, intrepid British aviators had looked down on its...
View ArticleBert Acosta: Bad Boy of the Air
One of the greatest early aerobatic pilots, Bert Acosta couldn’t overcome his inner demons. Early on the misty morning of June 29, 1927, the Fokker C.2 America sat idling at Roosevelt Field as the crew...
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The Other Franco
The future Spanish dictator’s brother blazed a trail across the South Atlantic but failed to attain his ultimate goal of a round-the-world flight. Early on January 22, 1926, the Spanish air force...
View ArticleAll in the Game
Despite the failure of his 1924 around-the-world attempt, Archibald MacLaren remained optimistic that such a flight ‘by one British machine and one British engine’ was possible. Flying perilously low,...
View ArticleThe Incredible ‘Winkle’ Brown
Few would argue with the contention that Eric Brown is the greatest test pilot who ever lived—except, of course, for Brown himself. First pilot to land a pure jet on an aircraft carrier. First to land...
View ArticleRoald Dahl’s Wartime Adventures
The celebrated children’s author flew Gloster Gladiators and Hawker Hurricanes for the RAF before he earned fame and fortune as a writer. Two hefty airmen grunted in unison as they lifted the pilot...
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Escape From Kabul in a Flock of Flying Elephants
Long before the famed Berlin Airlift, the Kabul airlift of 1928-29 established a precedent for all the aerial mercy missions that followed. Shortly before an icy dawn on December 23, 1928, 23 women and...
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The Flying Cowboy: Frederick Libby
The apprentice airman could scarcely believe his situation. Yesterday he had been a supply truck driver with the Canadian Ordnance Corps. Today he was flying as an observer in the Royal Flying Corps,...
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Forgotten First Flight Across the South Atlantic
At 0655 hours on March 30, 1922, the heavily laden Fairey IIID floatplane bound for Rio de Janeiro. At the controls in the open cockpit was 40-year-old Portuguese navy Commander Artur de Sacadura...
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Lord of the Distances Francesco de Pinedo
.image-13754542 { max-height: 100%; --left: 49.83%; --top: 60.47%; } Italian aviator Francesco de Pinedo earned accolades for his marathon flights, but his desire to break records ultimately proved a...
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