The Swedish Bomb
Beneath the crowded streets of Stockholm, there’s an underground, rock-lined cavern that today serves as a concert and entertainment hall. But back in 1954, it was home to R1, Sweden’s
Category: Flight Stories
High Flight – the Untold Story of Aviation’s Greatest Poem
Published on April 18, 2021 By Thomas Van Hare Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings; Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined
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Crisis in Space – MiG Mad Marine, John Glenn and Friendship 7
Published on March 21, 2021 By Thomas Van Hare On February 20, 1962, John Glenn, one of America’s most famous astronauts, climbed into the Mercury-Atlas 6 capsule “Friendship 7”. His
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The Red Stuff — the Soviet Chuck Yeager Revealed
Published on March 11, 2021 by Thomas Van Hare Most people know of Chuck Yeager, the pilot who first broke the sound barrier in 1947 in his bright orange Bell
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The Siege of Tsingtao
January 19, 2021 By Thomas Van Hare At the start of the Great War in 1914, Europe held sway over much of China. Great Britain had Hong Kong. The US
Kipling’s Visions of Conquest of the Air
Published on April 23, 2020 By Thomas C. Van Hare FAMILY DIRIGIBLE. A competent, steady man wanted for slow speed, low level Tangye dirigible. No night work, no sea trips.
The Shufti Kite
Published on March 20, 2020 By Thomas Van Hare Week after week on Saturdays — the Jewish sabbath — at roughly noon, the pilots of the newly founded Israeli Air
Pigs in Space!
Published June 5, 2018 By Ron Miller/io9 As much as we love The Muppets, in 1963 a pair of NASA engineers entertained the idea of sending real pigs into space.
By Rocket Plane Across the Atlantic
Published March 23, 2018 By Ron Miller/io9 A stubby-winged plane launches itself from an airport runway on the outskirts of Berlin. When it reaches an altitude of several miles, it
Who Invented the Rocketship?
Published on March 12, 2018 By Ron Miller/io9 The birth of the idea of traveling to other worlds through outer space can be given a specific date: January 7, 1610.
The 1935 Plan to Use Rocket Airplanes to Deliver US Mail
Published on March 6, 2018 By Ron Miller/io9.com In 1935, a wealthy, enterprising stamp dealer, 32-year-old Frido W. Kessler, came up with what seemed like a brilliant idea. He would
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The Six-Ship Takeoff
Published October 23, 2017 By Thomas Van Hare “Our job tomorrow will be to take off well before daylight for the first time in history and bomb the gun positions
A Daring Flight on D-Day
Published on June 6, 2017 By Thomas Van Hare On D-Day, June 6, 1944, after passing a tense and confusing early morning hours in the cockpit of his yellow-nosed Messerschmitt
The Curtiss Autoplane
Published on May 7, 2017 By Thomas Van Hare “At the aero show held at New York early this year there was exhibited a Curtiss triplane, which aroused the greatest
America’s Victory Program
Published on March 27, 2017 By Thomas Van Hare Montana Senator Burton K. Wheeler, a well-known Democratic Party isolationist, was shocked by what the US Army Air Corps officer, a
The Bombing of Tulsa
Published on February 27, 2017 By Thomas Van Hare On the morning of June 1, 1921, the Ku Klux Klan and the white population of Tulsa made their move. At
Encounter over the Iron Curtain
Published on February 10, 2017 By Thomas Van Hare The two USAFE F-84E Thunderjets made a beeline toward the border between West Germany and Czechoslovakia. At the border, they turned
Fritz Beckhardt’s Final Flight
On November 13, 1918, the pilots of the German fighter group, Kampfeinsitzerstaffel 5 (Kest 5), flew their final mission of the Great War. Two days earlier, at the 11th Hour
First Off at Pearl Harbor
Published on December 7, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare Exactly 75 years ago today, on December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, catching America by surprise. From the first
Puzzle Pictures
Published on November 19, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare The challenges of aerial photo interpretation are extraordinary. A dark smudge at the base of a hill may be the concealed
Royal Flush
Published on October 10, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare On Sunday, October 10, 1943 — 73 years ago in aviation history — the 8th Air Force flew a bombing raid
The First Air Support for Tanks
Published on October 3, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare Almost exactly one hundred years ago, the world’s first tanks rolled onto the battlefields of the Somme. Amazingly, the first use
The Dippy Twist Loop
Published on September 26, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare She was just the fourth woman in the world to be certified as a pilot. She was also the first to
“The Wright Aeroplane and its Fabled Performance”
Published on September 12, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare “A Parisian automobile paper recently published a letter from the Wright brothers to Capt. Ferber of the French army, in which
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The Special Mission
Published on August 22, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare Lieutenant Anselme Léon Emile Marchal took off into the gathering evening skies of France. After a brisk turn around his airfield,
Ten of My Rules for Air Fighting
Published on August 15, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare During the Battle of Britain, in nearly every RAF operations hut, you would find a small poster on the wall entitled,
The Great Air War by Stereoscope
Published on August 8, 2016 by Thomas Van Hare On the home front during the Great War, 100 years ago, 3D viewing of photographs was very popular, the most common
The Mystery of Immelmann’s Final Flight
Published on July 20, 2016 By Thomas Van Hare “It was 9 in the evening, when the rat-tat of aerial machine guns lured me out of my quarters, and I
USAFE’S Famed Flight Boots
Published on July 27, 2015 By Thomas Van Hare At the height of the Cold War, the US Air Force had dozens of fighter interceptor squadrons spread throughout Europe’s NATO
The Saqqara Bird
Published on May 7, 2015 By Thomas Van Hare In 1898, the famed “Egyptologists” of old uncovered the tomb of Pa-di-Imen at Saqqara, Egypt. As with every great discovery of
Defection to Israel!
Published on April 13, 2015 By Thomas Van Hare On Sunday, January 19, 1964, an Egyptian flight instructor based at Bilbeis AB in the Nile Delta, walked calmly to his
Surrender Flight to Ie Shima
Published on April 7, 2015 By Thomas Van Hare Most people, even most historians, would say that Japan surrendered to the United States at the end of World War II
The Black and White Marble
Published on April 1, 2015 By Thomas Van Hare On September 12, 1962, at Rice Stadium in Texas, President John F. Kennedy spoke these words: “We choose to go to
The Cigarette Club
Published March 17, 2015 By Thomas C. Van Hare These days, it seems that the only connection between cigarettes and aviation are signs in aircraft lavatories reading, “NO SMOKING”. Smoke
Hawaii to New Jersey for $75
Published March 9, 2015 By Thomas Van Hare On March 7 and 8, 1949, former USAAF pilot Captain William P. “Bill” Odom flew a V-tailed Beech Bonanza that he named, “Waikiki
The Right Stuff
Published February 18, 2015 by Thomas Van Hare Did you ever wonder where the term, “The Right Stuff” came from? Most people would say that it was a product of
An End to the Age of Innocence
Published on August 5, 2014 by Thomas Van Hare One hundred years ago this week, the world descended into the conflict we know now as World War I. Soon to
The First Drone
Published on August 29, 2013 By Thomas Van Hare The use of drones in military service has a long history. Many remember how German engineers created glide bombs during World
The FPV Revolution
Published on August 26, 2013 By Thomas Van Hare The heady days of the early 1910s are long past. Today, flying a plane or helicopter is expensive and challenging —
The Atlantique Incident — Part 1 of 2
Published on August 10, 2013 By Thomas Van Hare Squadron Leader P.K. Bundela and his wingman, Flight Officer S. Narayanan, were sitting ready at the Indian Air Force (IAF) base