Portal:Aviation/Today in aviation

October 31

• 2012 – First flight of the Shenyang J-31.

• 2011 – The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) announces the end of Operation Unified Protector, its military operations in Libya. Since taking command of the international intervention in the Libyan civil war on 31 March, its aircraft have carried out 9,600 strike sorties and destroyed more than 1,000 tanks, vehicles, and guns, as well as the Libyan air defense and command-and-control network.

• 2006 – Ajet, formerly Helios Airways, ceased operations.

• 2004 – Passenger airline service ends at Mirabel International Airport in Montreal, Canada.

• 2003 – British Airways’ flagship and first Concorde, G-BOAC, makes its final flight, ferrying from London Heathrow to Manchester, where it sits on display.

• 2001 – Air Canada Jetz, operated by Air Canada, commenced operations.

• 2000 – The first resident crew of the International Space Station lifts off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan aboard the Soyuz TM-31 spacecraft. The ISS has been continuously manned ever since.

• 2000 – A chartered Antonov An-26 explodes after takeoff in Northern Angola killing 50.

• 2000 – During heavy rain caused by Typhoon Xangsane, the flight crew of Singapore Airlines Flight 006, a Boeing 747-412, attempts to take off from Chiang Kai-shek International Airport in Taipei, Taiwan, using the wrong runway. During its takeoff roll, the plane is destroyed when it collides with construction equipment parked on the runway and bursts into flames, killing 83 of the 179 people on board and injuring 71 of the 96 survivors. It was the first fatal accident involving a Singapore Airlines aircraft other than the 1997 crash of an airliner operated by the Singapore Airlines subsidiary SilkAir. Among the injured survivors was William Wang, later the founder of Vizio.

• 1999 – EgyptAir Flight 990, a Boeing 767 bound for Cairo, Egypt, crashes into the Atlantic Ocean off Nantucket, Massachusetts, killing all 217 passengers and crew; cause is disputed: a deliberate suicide/homicide act by the relief first officer according to the NTSB, vs. a Boeing mechanical flaw according to Egyptian aviation authorities.

• 1997 – The first upgraded Tornado GR4, the strike attack version of the aircraft with modified systems and avionics. It was delivered to the RAF at Boscombe Down where it would begin trials.

• 1996 – TAM Transportes Aéreos Regionais Flight 402, a Fokker 100, crashes shortly after takeoff from Congonhas-São Paulo Airport, Brazil, striking an apartment building and several houses. All 90 passengers and 6 crew members on board die. Three people are killed on the ground.

• 1994 – American Eagle Flight 4184, an ATR 72 turboprop, crashes near Roselawn, Indiana, while waiting to land at Chicago, because of ice buildup on its wings. All 68 people on board died.

• 1990 – The Australian airline industry is deregulated. Airlines are allowed to select their own routes and set their own fares.

• 1987 – British Airways accepts the airline's first women pilots.

• 1980 – Fifth prototype Mikoyan MiG-29, 'samolet 908', which first flew on 5 April 1979 is utilized for powerplant testing after the loss of the third prototype. It, too, is lost when, on its 48th flight on this date, a combustion chamber fails and the resulting fire burns through control runs. Aircraft dives into the ground. A. V. Fedotov ejects while the aircraft is pulling negative G and receives a spinal injury that keeps him in hospital for several months.

• 1979 – Western Airlines Flight 2605, a McDonnell-Douglas DC-10, strikes a vehicle on a closed runway in dense fog at Mexico City, Mexico; 72 die.

• 1975 – Final Hawker-Siddeley P.1127 prototype (of six), XP984, first with new swept wing with leading edge extensions and steel cold nozzles, first flown in October 1963, is destroyed in landing accident at RAE Bedford.

• 1974 – First flight of the IAR-93

• 1973 – Three Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) escape from Mountjoy Prison in Dublin, Ireland after a hijacked helicopter lands in the prison’s exercise yard to pick them up.

• 1972 – Two pilots are killed in the crash of a Dassault Falcon 10 prototype.

• 1964 – Tornado collapses hangar of 1° Gruppo Elicotteri (First Helicopter Group), Italian Navy, at the Naval Air Station at Maristaeli Catania, destroying five Sikorsky SH-34G Seabat: MM143899, c/n 58-599, '4-06'; MM143940, c/n 58-710, '4-07'; MM143949, c/n 58-745, '4-08'; MM80163, c/n 58-990, '21', '4-01', and MM80164, c/n 58-991, '22', '4-02'.

• 1964 – NASA astronaut Theodore Freeman is killed when a goose smashes through the cockpit canopy of his Northrop T-38A-50-NO Talon jet trainer, 63-8188, at Ellington AFB, Texas. Flying shards of Plexiglas enter the jet engine intake, causing the engine to flameout. Freeman ejects but is too close to the ground for his parachute to open properly. He is posthumously awarded the Purple Heart.

• 1963 – LAC HF Schulz rescued an RCAF officer on board a Canadair CL-44D Yukon aircraft, who was in danger of being sucked out of a cargo door. LAC Schulz was awarded the British Empire Medal for Gallantry.

• 1960 – British European Airways retires its last piston-engined airliners.

• 1959 – Colonel G. Mosolov sets a new airspeed record of 2,387 km/h (1,483 mph) in the Mikoyan-Gurevich Ye-66

• 1956 – A US Navy R4D Skytrain is the first aircraft to land at the South Pole

• 1956 – The United Kingdom and France begin Operation Musketeer, an attempt to seize the Suez Canal from Egypt during the Suez Crisis, closely coordinated with Israel’s Operation Kadesh. The initial strikes against Egypt’s Almaza airfield by Cyprus-based Royal Air Force English Electric Canberras overnight on October 31-November 1 are ineffective.

• 1950 – The 1950 Heathrow British European Airways Viking accident: A British European Airways Vickers VC.1 Viking crashes on the runway at London Heathrow Airport in foggy weather; of the 30 on board, only a stewardess and a passenger survive.

• 1949 – Westland Wyvern test program suffers set-back when second prototype Wyvern TF Mk 2 (N.12/45), VP113, powered by Armstrong Siddeley Python turboprop, crashes in attempted dead-stick landing after the props seize in flight, test pilot killed.

• 1947 – Entered Service: Avro Tudor 4 with British South American Airways

• 1945 – No. 165 (Transport) Squadron was disbanded.

• 1943 – F4U Corsair accomplishes the first successful nighttime radar guided interception for the U.S. in the Pacific. It is also the naval service's first night kill in the Pacific. The tracking was done by VMF(N)-531's GCI equipment, which was located on Vella Lavella.

• 1943 – First flight of the Budd RB Conestoga

• 1934 – First prototype Tupolev ANT-40RT suffers engine problems on flight test out of TsAGI (Tsentral'nyy Aerodinamicheskiy i Gidrodinamicheskiy Institut- central aerodynamics and hydrodynamics institute), and pilot K. K. Popov makes a wheels-up forced landing at Khodynka Aerodrome. Repairs take until February 1935. It had made its first flight on 7 October.

• 1934 – The first Canadian-built aircraft with all-metal, monocoque fuselage, the Fairchild Super 71, was flown from the St Lawrence at Longueuil, Quebec.

• 1931 – First flight of the Westland Wallace

• 1930 – Michael Collins, American astronaut, was born. Collins was selected as part of the third group of fourteen astronauts 1963, he flew in space twice. His first spaceflight was Gemini 10, when he and command pilot John W. Young performed two rendezvous with different spacecraft and Collins undertook two EVAs. His second spaceflight was Apollo 11 where he served as the command module pilot.

• 1924 – Retired: Thomas-Morse MB-6

• 1920 – A Curtiss JN-4 became the first airplane used in a political campaign by spreading socialist literature for candidate Eugene V. Debs.

• 1917 – Fokker Dr.I 121/17, flown by Lt. Pastor from Jasta 11, one of the JG.1 units under Manfred von Richthofen, suffers structural failure and crashes. Second such crash in three days causes all Fokker Triplanes to be grounded immediately with affected flight crew reverting temporarily to Albatros D.Va and Pfalz D.III scouts. Accidents are investigated 2 November, reports issued 13 days later. Instructions for manufacturing and assembly improvements are implemented, production and flying resume 28 November.

• 1911 – John Montgomery is fatally injured in a crash of his Evergreen glider near San Jose, California.

References

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