A History of Air Transportation
The history of flight is filled with innovators, from Leonardo da Vinci to today’s aerospace engineers. Humans dreamed of flying for centuries before inventing the technology to make air transportation a reality, and today, their ideas and designs have formed the foundation of an industry that moves people and products around the world and even beyond the confines of Earth’s atmosphere.
1506: Leonardo da Vinci publishes Codex on the Flight of Birds, containing detailed notes on the aerodynamics of flight that would guide the development of human-made aircraft.
1783: Brothers Jacques-Étienne and Joseph-Michel Montgolfier successfully launch a hot air balloon with a human passenger in Paris.
1809: George Cayley, an English philosopher, publishes On Aerial Navigation, a foundational work in the field of aerodynamics.
1852: Henri Giffard flies the first steam-powered airship over Paris.
1876: Nikolaus Otto develops a lighter gas-powered engine that revolutionizes the nascent field of car design and development and makes it possible for flying machines to travel farther and be easier to control.
1903: Orville and Wilbur Wright achieve the first powered, controlled airplane flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
1907: Paul Cornu is the first to pilot a vertical-lift aircraft with a rotating wing, the earliest version of a helicopter.
1909: Louis Blériot completes the first airplane flight across a body of water, flying across the English Channel from France to England.
1911: Harriet Quimby becomes the first woman to earn a pilot’s license. The following year, she would become the first woman to fly across the English Channel solo.
1914: Florida pilot Tony Jannus conducts the first commercial flight, charging his passenger, the mayor of St. Petersburg, $5 to take him across Tampa Bay.
1914: Airplanes begin being used as implements of war, seeing widespread use in combat during World War I.
1919: Two British pilots, John Alcock and Arthur Brown, complete the first successful nonstop transatlantic flight, taking 16 hours to fly from Newfoundland, Canada, to Ireland.
1921: Bessie Coleman of Texas finishes training at a French aviation school to become the first black woman to earn a pilot’s license.
1923: Two pilots with the U.S. Army Air Service, Lt. Oakley Kelly and Lt. John Macready, make the first nonstop cross-country flight.
1927: Charles Lindbergh becomes the first pilot to cross the Atlantic Ocean alone, flying nonstop from New York to Paris.
1932: Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.
1933: The Boeing 247, a metal monoplane that could carry ten passengers, makes its first flight, becoming the first modern airliner put into service.
1937: The Hindenburg crashes and explodes, ending the era of the airship.
1939: The German Heinkel He 178 proves that jet propulsion is viable for airplanes.
1941: The largest four airlines (American Airlines, Eastern Air Lines, Trans World Airlines, and United Airlines) create Air Cargo Inc. to provide shipping services for freight.
1947: Test pilot Chuck Yeager hits 700 mph, breaking the sound barrier, while testing the Bell X-1, a rocket-powered aircraft.
1949: Britain’s de Havilland Comet shows what’s possible for commercial flight, boasting a pressurized cabin with large windows, comfortable seating, and four turbine engines that can take the plane above the clouds, minimizing turbulence.
1976: The Concorde is put into service as the first commercial supersonic passenger jet.
1978: The U.S. Air Force introduces an F-16 with an electronic flight control system, ushering in the era of computerized flight.
1981: The space shuttle Columbia launches, becoming the first reusable spacecraft to take to the skies.
1986: Pilots Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager complete the first nonstop around-the-world flight.
2004: SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately developed vehicle to carry people into space.
2016: The Solar Impulse becomes the first solar-powered plane to fly around the world.
2023: The VSS Unity, a Virgin Galactic spacecraft, becomes the first to provide a commercial flight to space.
This page was last updated by Marc Gregory
