At the end of 1912 Jacques Schneider announced his intention of presenting an annual trophy for an international seaplane contest. There were only twelve Schneider contests but they were major international events with the major rivals being Britain and Italy, followed by France and the US. Biplane seaplanes and flying-boats predominated the early contests and some very advanced twin-float biplanes were among the winners as late as 1925. However, it was the monoplane which was to become the symbol of Schneider Trophy, with Supermarine and Macchi designs reaching the peak of racing seaplane performance. The final winning combination of Supermarine airframe and Rolls-Royce engine was to make a vital contribution to Britain's defence in 1940 in the form of the Rolls-Royce powered Hurricane and Spitfire. This book records the contests and, in considerable detail, the design, development and achievements of the participating aircraft; those which failed to take part; and the projects, some of which embodied very advanced ideas even if they were proved to be unrealistic.

Skyward is as much the memoir of great American explorer Admiral Richard E. Byrd, Jr. as it is a fascinating narrative of America's early aviation history, much of which Byrd shaped with his explorations as a naval pilot and pioneering scientist. Through the life of Admiral Byrd, we see the seeds of America's aerial military force, commercial airline travel, and our understanding of the planet's most remote geographical locations planted. Byrd's outsized ambition has inspired generations to dare to push technological limits in order to achieve things greater than themselves. Reissued for today's readers, Admiral Byrd's classic explorations by land, air, and sea transport us to the farthest reaches of the globe. As companions on Byrd's journeys, modern audiences experience the polar landscape through Byrd's own struggles, doubts, revelations, and triumphs and share the excitement of these timeless adventures.

Phantom in Combat puts you in the cockpit with the missile-age aces as they fight for their lives in the skies of Vietnam and the Middle East.\nStarting with a brief account of the forging of this deadly weapon, Phantom in Combat moves to the wars, campaigns and single engagements in which it was used to such telling effect. Leading USAF ace Steve Ritchie speaks more in sorrow than anger of the politically inspired rules that so frustrated him and his comrades in Vietnam. The story of the gruelling dogfight that made Randy Cunningham and Willie Driscoll the U.S. Navys only aces is redolent of the sweat, toil and terror of high-speed air fighting. And combat reports from some of Israels anonymous aces speak laconically of victories, losses, hairs-breadth escapes, and, above all, the Phantoms ability to give and take enormous punishment.\nProviding a rich background to this testimony is a wealth of rare material, including:\n- Battle-damage and gun-camera photographs\n- Recently declassified U.S. Navy tactical diagrams\n- Photo-sequence showing the destruction of an F-4 by a North Vietnamese missile.\n- Official analysis of the USAFs most successful MiG-trapping operation, led by the famous General Robin Olds.\n- Complete listing of USAF and USN air-to-air victories in Vietnam.\nHere is the human face of modern air warfare, described by the commanders and crews who earned for the Phantom its reputation as the worlds finest fighting aircraft.

Over the past eight decades, developments in vertical lift aircraft-both helicopters and vertical/short takeoff and landing (V/STOL) planes-have given the American military unparalleled capabilities on the modern battlefield. The U.S. has led the world in vertical lift technologies with the help of some of the brightest minds in this field-Igor I. Sikorsky, Arthur M. Young, Frank N. Piasecki, Charles H. Kaman and Stanley Hiller, Jr., to name a few-and by having the industrial prowess to make their concepts reality. This book gives a concise historical survey, including technical specifications, drawings, and photographs of every type of helicopter and V/STOL aircraft developed for the U.S. military, from the earliest examples tested in 1941 and 1942, up to the newest prototypes.

Founded in 1916 by William E. Boeing, a wealthy timber merchant, the mighty Boeing Company's 100-year history spans decades of rich achievement and technological development. Beginning with the manufacture of seaplanes, fighters and, from the 1930s onwards, huge bombers, Boeing pioneered innovative transports - gigantic airliners, missiles, rockets and most recently vehicles for space exploration and satellites. Constantly evolving, Boeing set out to develop an entirely new jet transport, and in 1954 the innovative 707 appeared. The 727 and 737 airliners quickly followed and in 1969 the revolutionary 747. By 1975 the 'Jumbo Jet' was being produced in seven different models and new versions continue to be developed to this day. Aviation author and historian Martin Bowman looks back over 100 years of Boeing's history, detailing the story of the company from its humble side-project beginnings to its ascent into being one of the world's largest aircraft manufacturers.

The Northrop YF-17 holds a special place in aircraft history. The YF-17 was one of the two prototypes tested in the U.S. Air Force Air Combat Fighter competition, a program which attempted to reverse the trend of increasing cost and complexity of new fighter aircraft, and which resulted in the selection and manufacture of the F-16 as the next generation free world fighter. Even though the YF-17 lost the USAF competition, it was the prototype for the U.S. Navys F/A-18 aircraft. Don Logan is also the author of Rockwell B-1B: SACs Last Bomber, The 388th Tactical Fighter Wing: At Korat Royal Thai Air Force Base 1972, and Northrops T-38 Talon: A Pictorial History(all three available from Schiffer Publishing Ltd.).

Born into a family of aviators, Merrill Wien was destined to become a pilot. His father, Noel Wien, was one of the first pilots to fly in Alaska and his life was full of firsts, including making the first round-trip flight between Asia and North America in 1929. His mother played a big role in the founding and development of Wien Alaska Airlines, the second-oldest scheduled airline in the United States and territories. One of the most versatile and experienced pilots of his time, Merrill has flown just about every aircraft imaginable from DC-3s to Lockheed 1011s to historic military planes like the cargo C-46 and B-29 bomber to the Hiller UH-12E chopper. Although fundamentally modest by nature, family and friends encouraged Merrill to share his remarkable stories given his accomplishments and experiences with so many famous people and events. His tone is engagingly informal as he recounts crossing paths with such luminaries as Joe Crosson, Howard Hughes, Lowell Thomas Sr. and Lowell Thomas Jr., Sam White, Don Sheldon, Brad Washburn, Wally Schirra, and Bill Anders. He re-creates for readers his firsthand experiences flying top-secret missions for the Air Force, viewing the devastation of the Good Friday Earthquake in Anchorage, and the challenges of starting his own helicopter company, to name just a few. His fascinating narrative is complemented by photographs from his personal archives. Includes a list of all the different aircraft Wien has been endorsed to fly at the back of the book.

This stylishly illustrated book looks back at the future of air travel and is as sleek and elegant as the Concorde aircraft it celebrates—now in an enlarged edition.

When the first commercial Concorde flights zoomed off the runways in Paris and London in the late 1960s, crossing the Atlantic in just under three hours, they established a new standard for luxury flight. Powered by 38,000 pounds of thrust and easily recognizable with its delta wing and drooping nose, the Concorde jet embodied the pinnacle of aviation technology and industrial design. It quickly became the preferred mode of transatlantic flight for superstars and business moguls alike.

Opening with a lively history of the jet and how it changed travel, the book focuses on the look and feel of the Concorde. Photos of the jet's evolving interiors show how the original, starkly designed cabin gave way to luxury seats and interiors designed by the likes of Raymond Loewy, Sir Terence Conran and Andrée Putman. Filled with fascinating historical and technical background, and drawn from the author's personal collection of more than one thousand Concorde-related objects, this elegant book offers rarely seen historical photography and firsthand contributions from the people who helped create the Concorde experience from take-off to landing and beyond.

Covers the design and multiple uses of the Heinkel He 115.

Few shapes rolling down the highway are as instantly recognizable as silver Airstream trailer homes. With over 200 sparkling color images and engaging text, this book presents David Winick's adventure re-creating custom-built Airstream home trailers that date from1948 to 2007, including his 75th Anniversary Bambi trailer. The challenge of making functional and beautiful small living spaces helped drive the restoration work. Learn the process, beginning with empty shells and ending with rolling Airstream art. This book will enlighten the growing legion of Airstream aficionados, architects and designers with a passion for small space living, and all who have ever camped or admired an Airstream.

The legendary STUKA in a new collection of World War II era photos over a variety of war fronts.

This volume focuses on the influence of America's Second World War aviation development and experience, subsequent aviation technological advances, and world events, in shaping American choices in military aircraft and associated weapons' development during the few years following the war. It shows how air warfare weapons from the last conflict were carried forward and altered, how new systems evolved from these, and how the choices fared in the next war-Korea. The period was one of remarkable progress in a short span of time via a great many aircraft and weapons programs, and associated technological progress. These systems were of immense importance influencing and growing the engineering, production, and operational capabilities to be exploited for the next generation of weapons that soon followed. Emphasized is the innovative features or new technology and how these contributed to advancing American military aviation, influencing the evolution of follow-on models or types. Included are military prototype, experimental, and research aircraft that are equally important in understanding the history of American aircraft development. Combat employment, progress, and equipment adaptation during the Korean Conflict is then highlighted. Tabulated characteristics are provided of those aircraft that entered production or represented significant technological advances influencing others that follow.

The possibilities of flight have long fascinated us. Each innovation captivated a broad public, from those who gathered to witness winged medieval visionaries jumping from towers, to those who tuned in to watch the moon landings. Throughout history, the visibility of airborne objects from the ground has made for a spectacle of flight, with sizeable crowds gathering for eighteenth-century balloon launches and early twentieth-century air shows. Taking to the Air tells the history of flight through the eye of the spectator, and later, the passenger. Focusing on moments of great cultural impact, this book is a visual celebration of the wonder of flight, based on the large and diverse collection of print imagery held by the British Library. It is a study of how flight has been thought and pictured.

As the Allies were approaching the German frontier at the beginning of September 1944, the German Armed Forces responded with a variety of initiatives designed to regain the strategic initiative. While the "Wonder Weapons" such as the V-1 flying bomb, the V-2 missile and the Messerschmitt Me-262 jet fighter are widely recognized as being the most prominent of these initiatives upon which Germany pinned so much hope, the Volks-Grenadier Divisions (VGDs) are practically unknown. Often confused with the Volkssturm, the Home Guard militia, VGDs have suffered the undeserved reputation as second-rate formations, filled with young boys and old men suited to serve only as cannon fodder. This groundbreaking book, now reappearing as a new edition, shows that VGDs were actually conceived as a new, elite corps loyal to the National Socialist Party composed of men from all branches of Hitler's Wehrmacht and equipped with the finest ground combat weapons available. Whether fighting from defensive positions or spearheading offensives such as the Battle of the Bulge, VGDs initially gave a good account of themselves in battle. Using previously unpublished unit records, Allied intelligence and interrogation reports and above all interviews with survivors, the author has crafted an in-depth look at a late-war German infantry company, including many photographs from the veterans themselves. In this book we follow along with the men of the 272nd VGD's Fusilier Company from their first battles in the Huertgen Forest to their final defeat in the Harz Mountains. Along the way we learn the enormous potential of VGDs . . . and feel their soldiers' heartbreak at their failure. Among Douglas Nash's previous works is Hell's Gate: The Battle for the Cherkassy Pocket, January-February 1944, a work unsurpassed for insight into the other side of the hill in WWII.

Howard Hughes, the movie mogul, aviation pioneer and political hound dog, has always fascinated the public with his mixture of secrecy, dashing lifestyle and reclusiveness. Companies responsible for major technological leaps often become household names. An exception is Howard Hughes s pioneering helicopter company, Hughes Helicopters, a name that has fallen into oblivion. Yet most schoolboys in the world have heard of the company s prize-winning product: the Apache helicopter. Hughes popularized the light helicopter trainer, mass-produced the first turbine powered light observation helicopter, led the way in hot cycle rotor craft propulsion research and, finally, developed the world s most advanced attack helicopter that was purchased and saw service with the UK. Here s how some of the world s most innovative helicopters were developed. Covering the period from the Second World War until the mid-1980s, you will learn why Hughes military aircraft contracts came under close scrutiny by the US government. The story is rich with tales of technological breakthrough and test-flying bravado made possible by a small crew of engineers and daring pilots. Written by a technical expert and insider to the industry, Howard s Whirlybirds: Howard Hughes Amazing Pioneering Helicopter Exploits is a fascinating and alternative view on the phenomenal pioneer with unpublished photographs and material that will fascinate the aviation and military historian as well as the casual reader and cinema buff."

The writing of this book, the first in-depth and fully detailed research about the early years of the Chel Ha'avir - from the light-plane days to the supersonic fighters received roughly ten years later - is the culmination of a long research period by the author. Research that was made harder by the tight - but understandable and respected - security measures involving Israel's Forces. An exceptional source of information has been the help provided by many Chel Ha'Avir veterans who fought in the early days during 1948/1949, and those who helped establish a viable air force in 1949-1956 in spite of tight budgets, obsolescent equipment and lack of experience, and also those who fought in Sinai in late 1956, establishing the seeds for its future role as the airborne shield of Israel. As the reader will discover, the beginnings were extremely hard, and the Chel Ha'Avir had to face unfriendly attitudes from both the United States and the United Kingdom, which took place while many people - civilian and military - were dying in the newborn Hebrew state. But in observing that official policies do not always reflect the citizenship's feelings, most of the colorful band of foreign volunteers that helped the Chel Ha'avir - and the other defense forces - to resist, fight back and win, came from those countries. These foreign volunteers, mostly with combat experience in World War II, provided a core in which many highly talented young Israelis learned fast. One thing was certain, then and now; Israel exists because of the resolute people that live in this small country, both civilian and military, but above all because of the Chel Ha'avir which in the following years would be proclaimed the most combat experienced air force in the world.

This little known Heinkel fighter design was eventually canceled yet saw service in the Spanish Civil War.

This new book is a detailed survey and a anew perspective on the development of Luftwaffe aircraft from 1935-1945. Special emphasis has been placed on details of weaponry, equipment and other areas that have up to now been inadequately covered. Many readers will therefore be rewarded with new insights into the area of German aircraft development, as well as the logistics of the Luftwaffe flying units.\nThe book is organized into the basic elements of the German Lutfwaffe - presenting training, pilot operations and ground crews, the individual development steps during aircraft construction, testing, pre-production models, production and finally combat usage. Numerous examples of weapons and supplemental armament, as well as diverse weapons systems and ordinance can be found throughout.\nManfred Griehl and Joachim Dressel are also the authors of Luftwaffe Airfield Equipment (available from Schiffer Publishing).

Years before Charles Lindbergh's flight from New York to Paris electrified the nation, a group of daredevil pilots, most of them veterans of the World War I, brought aviation to the masses by competing in the sensational transcontinental air race of 1919. The contest awakened Americans to the practical possibilities of flight, yet despite its significance, it has until now been all but forgotten. In The Great Air Race, journalist and amateur pilot John Lancaster finally reclaims this landmark event and the unheralded aviators who competed to be the fastest man in America. His thrilling chronicle opens with the race's impresario, Brigadier General Billy Mitchell, who believed the nation's future was in the skies. Mitchell's contest-critics called it a stunt-was a risky undertaking, given that the DH-4s and Fokkers the contestants flew were almost comically ill-suited for long-distance travel: engines caught fire in flight; crude flight instruments were of little help in clouds and fog; and the brakeless planes were prone to nosing over on landing. Yet the aviators possessed an almost inhuman disregard for their own safety, braving blizzards and mechanical failure as they landed in remote cornfields or at the edges of cliffs. Among the most talented were Belvin "The Flying Parson" Maynard, whose dog, Trixie, shared the rear cockpit with his mechanic, and John Donaldson, a war hero who twice escaped German imprisonment. Jockeying reporters made much of their rivalries, and the crowds along the race's route exploded, with everyday Americans eager to catch their first glimpse of airplanes and the mythic "birdmen" who flew them. The race was a test of endurance that many pilots didn't finish: some dropped out from sheer exhaustion, while others, betrayed by their engines or their instincts, perished. For all its tragedy, Lancaster argues, the race galvanized the nation to embrace the technology of flight. A thrilling tale of men and their machines, The Great Air Race offers a new origin point for commercial aviation in the United States, even as it greatly expands our pantheon of aviation heroes.

The Sahara Desert, February 1962: the wreckage of a plane emerges from the sands revealing, too, the body of the plane’s long-dead pilot. But who was he? And what had happened to him?

Baker Street, London, June 1927: twenty-five-year-old Jessie Miller had fled a loveless marriage in Australia, longing for adventure in the London of the Bright Young Things. At a gin-soaked party, she met Bill Lancaster, fresh from the Royal Air force, his head full of a scheme that would make him as famous as Charles Lindbergh, who has just crossed the Atlantic. Lancaster wanted to fly three times as far – from London to Melbourne – and in Jessie Miller he knew he had found the perfect co-pilot.

By the time they landed in Melbourne, the daring aviators were a global sensation – and, despite still being married to other people, deeply in love. Keeping their affair a secret, they toured the world until the Wall Street Crash changed everything; Bill and Jessie – like so many others – were broke. And it was then, holed up in a run-down mansion on the outskirts of Miami and desperate for cash, that Jessie agreed to write a memoir. When a dashing ghostwriter Haden Clark was despatched from New York, the toxic combination of the handsome interloper, bootleg booze and jealousy led to a shocking crime. The trial that followed put Jessie and Bill back on the front pages and drove him to a reckless act of abandon to win it all back.

The Lost Pilots is their extraordinary story, brought to vivid life by Corey Mead. Based on years of research and startling new evidence, and full of adventure, forbidden passion, crime, scandal and tragedy, it is a masterwork of narrative nonfiction that firmly restores one of aviation’s leading female pioneers to her rightful place in history.

Reducing Airline’s Carbon Footprint is the answer to the airline executives’ problems, when it comes to looking for ways to reduce aircraft operations cost. Reducing Airline’s Carbon Footprint introduces the Electric Taxi System, ETS. When commercial aircrafts are equipped with this system, the cost of operation will be reduced due to taxi without the main engines running. Also, the aircraft engines will not be ingesting foreign object debris (FOD) causing damage to the internal moving parts, and the airport area air pollution will see a decrease. This is the grey cloud that hovers over most busy airports. Reducing Airline’s Carbon Footprint breaks through this cloud by providing ETS as the solution. Throughout its pages, Dr. Thomas F Johnson addresses these benefits of ETS: Improvement of Airport Area Air Quality Reduce aircraft carbon footprint Potential Costs of ETS Installation Fuel Consumption Evaluation before and after ETS installation Ground Taxi Time Evaluation Improved Airport Terminal Accessibility Landing Gear Compatibility for the ETS Installation

Robert Mikesh takes the reader step by step through the process of aircraft restoration from the initial decision to prepare for an exhibit: Does it fit the museum's aims? How will it be displayed? Will it fly? And of course: Is it good value? Initial preparation before disassembly are noted and then the principal techniques in working with wood-and-fabric, and metal aircraft are discussed, using many interesting real examples. Types of propulsion, tires, colors and markings are covered systematically and the different requirements for indoor or outdoor exhibition are shown. This book is considered the authoritative reference to the wide and complex subject of aircraft preservation and restoration.