1979 in aviation

Years in aviation:	1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982
Centuries:	19th Century · 20th century · 21st century
Decades:	1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s
Years:	1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982

This is a list of aviation-related events from 1979:

Events

January

• January 12 – Pilatus Aircraft acquires Britten-Norman.
• January 30 – Varig Boeing 707-320C PP-VLU, a cargo plane, disappears over the Pacific Ocean 30 minutes after departing Tokyo's Narita International Airport. Its wreck is never found. Lost along with the six people on board are 153 paintings by Manabu Mabe. The captain had been the pilot of Varig Flight 820, which had crashed in France in 1973.

February

• February 12 – Members of the Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) shoot down Air Rhodesia Flight 827, the Vickers Viscount Umniati, with a Strela 2 (NATO reporting name "SA-7 Grail") surface-to-air missile in the Vuti African Purchase Area of Rhodesia east of Lake Kariba, killing all 59 people on board.
• February 18 – Flying from Coast Guard Air Station Cape Cod in Sandwich, Massachusetts, in bad weather to rescue a crewman in distress aboard the Japanese fishing vessel Kasei Maru #18, the United States Coast Guard Sikorsky HH-3F Pelican helicopter CG-1432 loses power and ditches in heavy seas in the North Atlantic Ocean 180 nautical miles (207 mi; 333 km) southeast of Nantucket, Massachuetts. One Canadian Armed Forces and three U.S. Coast Guard personnel aboard die; Kasei Maru No. 18 rescues one U.S. Coast Guard crewman and recovers the bodies of the other four men.
• February 26 – Production of the A-4 Skyhawk ends after 26 years, with the delivery of the 2,690th and final aircraft to the United States Marine Corps.
• February 28 – Since January 1, Tanzania has shot down 19 Ugandan aircraft during the Uganda-Tanzania War. The losses drive the Ugandan Air Force out of the war.

March

• March 10 – The United States Air Force sends Boeing E-3 Sentry airborne warning and control system (AWACS) aircraft to monitor the civil war in Yemen.
• March 14 – A British-built Hawker Siddeley Trident crashes into a factory in Beijing, China, killing an estimated 200 people, including a dozen crew and passengers and scores of victims in the factory.
• March 25 – Qantas retires its last Boeing 707 and becomes the world's first airline with a fleet made up exclusively of Boeing 747s.
• March 29 – Quebecair Flight 255, a Fairchild F-27, suffers an engine explosion minutes after takeoff from Québec City Jean Lesage International Airport in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. While attempting to return to the airport, the airliner crashes into a hillside, killing 17 of the 24 people on board.

April

• April 4 – Trans World Airlines Flight 841, a Boeing 727-31 with 89 people on board on a flight from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in Minneapolis, Minnesota, suddenly rolls sharply to the right over Saginaw, Michigan, and goes into a spiral dive from 39,000 feet (11,887 m) including two 360-degree rolls despite corrective measures taken by both the autopilot and the human pilot, losing 34,000 (10,363 m) of altitude in 63 seconds before the flight crew manages to pull out of the dive at 5,000 feet (1,524 m). Eight passengers suffer minor injuries caused by exposure to high G forces. The plane makes an emergency landing at Detroit, Michigan, without further incident.

May

• May 16 – A New York Airways Sikorsky S-61 helicopter tips over while taking on passengers at the Pan Am Building in New York City, killing four. The heliport is closed permanently after the accident.
• May 25 – American Airlines Flight 191, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 crashes at O'Hare International Airport, Chicago during take-off after its number one engine detaches during its takeoff roll, killing all 271 on board and two more on the ground. DC-10s are then grounded across the United States.
• May 27 – The prime minister of Mauritania, Ahmed Ould Bouceif, dies in an airplane crash in the Atlantic Ocean off Dakar, Senegal.

June

• June 12 – Flying the Gossamer Albatross from Folkestone Warren, England, to a French beach south of Cap Gris-Nez in 2 hours 49 minutes, Bryan Allen becomes the first person to cross the English Channel in a pedal-powered aircraft.
• June 17 – Air New England Flight 248, a de Havilland DHC-6 Twin Otter 300, crashes at Camp Greenough in the Yarmouth Port section of Yarmouth, Massachusetts, while on approach to a landing at Barnstable Municipal Airport in Barnstable County, Massachusetts. The pilot, Air New England co-founder George Parmenter, dies, but the other nine people on board all survive, including author Robert Sabbag.
• June 20 – Nikola Kavaja, a Serbian nationalist and anti-communist, hijacks American Airlines Flight 293, a Boeing 727, shortly before it lands in Chicago, Illinois, intending to gain control of an aircraft that he can crash into Yugoslav Communist Party headquarters in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. He allows the passengers and most of the crew to debark, then orders the crew to fly the 727 to LaGuardia Airport in New York City. There he demands and receives a Boeing 707, which he orders to be flown to Shannon, Ireland, where he intends to take control of the 707 for the suicide flight to Belgrade, but the hijacking ends when he surrenders to authorities in Shannon.
• June 27 – Israeli Air Force F-15 Eagles shoot down four Syrian Air Force Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21s

July

• July 1 – North Central Airlines and Southern Airways merge to form Republic Airlines, with headquarters at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
• July 11 – A Garuda Indonesia Fokker F-28 Fellowship crashes into Mount Sibayak on Sumatra in Indonesia, killing all 61 people on board.
• July 23 – The British government announces plans to privatise British Airways and publicly sell British Aerospace shares.
• July 31 – Dan-Air Flight 0034, a Hawker Siddeley HS 748, crashes into the sea while attempting to take off from Sumburgh Airport on the Shetland Mainland in Scotland, drowning 17 of the 47 people on board.

August

• August 11 – Two Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-134 jetliners collide in mid-air over Dniprodzerzhynsk in the Soviet Union's Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, killing all 156 people aboard the two planes. Among the dead are 17 players and staff of the then-Soviet-top-division Pakhtakor Football Club team.
• August 14 – Steve Hinton sets a new piston-engined airspeed record in a specially-modified P-51 Mustang named the RB51 Red Baron. He reaches 499 mph (803 km/h) over Nevada.

October

• October 30 – Sir Barnes Wallis, inventor of the bouncing bomb, geodetic airframe, and earthquake bomb, dies at the age of 82.
• October 31 – Western Airlines Flight 2605, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-10, mistakenly lands on a closed runway in fog at Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City, Mexico, strikes a parked truck, crashes, and bursts into flames. Seventy-two of the 89 people on board die.

November

• November 11 – Hawaiian Airlines celebrates 50 years of accident-free air passenger service.
• November 15 – A bomb planted by the Unabomber in the cargo hold of a Boeing 727 operating as American Airlines Flight 444 from Chicago, Illinois, to Washington, D.C., malfunctions, failing to detonate but giving off large quantities of smoke. Twelve of the 78 people on board are treated for smoke inhalation. The attack brings the Federal Bureau of Investigation into the Unabomber investigation for the first time because attacking the airliner is the Unabomber's first federal crime.
• November 26 – A flight attendant reports a fire aboard Pakistan International Airlines Flight 740, a Boeing 707-340C, 18 minutes after takeoff from Jeddah International Airport in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The fire spreads rapidly, causing panic in the passenger cabin and incapacitating the flight crew and the aircraft crashes, killing all 156 people on board.
• November 28 – A Douglas DC-10 operating as Air New Zealand Flight 901 crashes on Mount Erebus in Antarctica during a sightseeing flight, killing all 257 people aboard.

December

• December 23 – The Turkish Airlines Fokker F28-1000 Fellowship Trabzon crashes into a hill near Kuyumcuköy in the Çubuk district of Ankara Province while on approach to Esenboğa Airport in Ankara, killing 41 of the 45 people on board.
• December 25 – Antonov An-12s and An-22s airlift the first Soviet troops into Afghanistan. 5,000 arrive in the first 24 hours.

First flights

• Antonov An-32 ("Cline")

February

• February 28 - PAC Cresco

March

• March 9 - Dassault Mirage 4000
• March 22 - CP-140 Aurora

April

• April 10 - Westland WG.30 G-BGHF
• April 19 - Learjet 55

May

• May 15 - Dassault Mirage 50
• May 18 - Piper PA-42 Cheyenne

June

• June 12 - Rutan Long-EZ prototype, N79RA

July

• July 24 - Bell XV-15

October

• October 27 - Panavia Tornado ADV

November

• November 30 - Piper Malibu

December

• December 12 - SH-60 Seahawk 161169
• December 14 - Edgley Optica G-BGMW
• December 21 - NASA AD-1
• December 22 - Aérospatiale Epsilon

Entered service

January

• January 6 - F-16 Fighting Falcon with the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing USAF.