Transatlantic flight

Transatlantic flight is the flight of an aircraft across the Atlantic Ocean. A transatlantic flight may proceed east-to-west, originating in Europe or Africa and terminating in North America or South America, or it may go in the reverse direction, west-to-east. Such flights have been accomplished by fixed-wing aircraft, airships, balloons and other devices.

The Atlantic Ocean stood as a significant obstacle to the aviation pioneers of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The first aircraft engines did not have sufficient reliability necessary for the crossing, nor sufficient power to lift the required fuel. Additionally, there are difficulties navigating over featureless expanses of water for thousands of miles, and the weather, especially in the North Atlantic Ocean is often unpredictable and violent. Since the middle of the 20th century, however, transatlantic flight has been routine and common, for commercial, military, diplomatic, and other purposes. Experimental flights (in balloons, small aircraft, etc.) still present technological challenges for transatlantic fliers.

First transatlantic flight

See also: Transatlantic flight of Alcock and Brown

Between 8 and 31 May 1919, the Curtiss seaplane NC-4 made a crossing of the Atlantic flying from the U.S. to Newfoundland, then to the Azores and on to Portugal and finally the UK. The whole journey took 23 days. NC-4 was the only one of the three United States Navy aircraft to set out that completed the journey. The journey had been organized by the U.S. Navy to include crew rest, aircraft maintenance and repair and refueling, and had been supported by a trail of 53 "station ships" across the Atlantic giving the aircraft points to navigate by.

On 14–15 June 1919, British aviators Alcock and Brown made the first non-stop transatlantic flight. They flew a modified World War I Vickers Vimy bomber from St. John's, Newfoundland, to Clifden, Connemara, County Galway, Ireland. Winston Churchill presented them with the Daily Mail prize for the first crossing of the Atlantic Ocean in "less than 72 consecutive hours" and they were knighted at Windsor Castle by King George V.

The first east-west non-stop transatlantic crossing by an aeroplane was made in 1928 by the Bremen, a German Junkers W33 type aircraft, from Baldonnel Airfield in County Dublin, Ireland.

History

By rigid airship

On 2 July 1919, Major George Herbert Scott of the Royal Air Force with his crew and passengers flies from RAF East Fortune, Scotland to Mineola, New York (on Long Island) in airship R34, covering a distance of about 3,000 statute miles (4,800 km) in about four and a half days. R34 then made the return trip to England arriving at RNAS Pulham in 75 hours, thus also completing the first double crossing of the Atlantic (east-west-east).

First intercontinental passenger airship flight

Flown picture postcard from the "First North American Flight" of the D-LZ127 (1928)

For more details on transatlantic airship flights, see LZ 127, R100 and LZ 129.

On 11 October 1928, Hugo Eckener, commanding the Graf Zeppelin airship as part of DELAG's operations, began the first non-stop transatlantic passenger flights, leaving Friedrichshafen, Germany, at 07:54 on 11 October 1928, and arriving at NAS Lakehurst, New Jersey, on 15 October.

Passenger Zeppelin services, 1928–37

Thereafter, DELAG used both the Graf Zeppelin and the Hindenburg for regular scheduled passenger services across the North Atlantic, from Frankfurt-am-Main to Lakehurst. From the summer of 1931 a South Atlantic route was also introduced, from Frankfurt and Friedrichshafen to Recife and Rio de Janeiro. Between 1931 and 1937, the Graf Zeppelin crossed the South Atlantic 136 times. In 1936, the Hindenburg entered passenger service and made 36 Atlantic crossings (North and South). Both routes operated a regularly scheduled timetable until the cessation of passenger Zeppelin operations following the Hindenburg disaster in May 1937.

R100

The British rigid airship R100 also made a successful return trip from Cardington to Montreal in July–August 1930, in what was intended to be a proving flight for regularly scheduled passenger services. Following the R101 disaster in October 1930, the British rigid airship programme was abandoned and the R100 scrapped, leaving DELAG as the sole remaining operator of transatlantic passenger airship flights.

By balloon

Fourteen attempts at crossing the Atlantic by balloon were known to be made before the first successful one, with the Double Eagle II, was completed from Presque Isle, Maine, to Miserey, near Paris, France in 1978, long after aircraft were already making transatlantic flights.

The first ideas of transatlantic flight came about during the mid-19th century period of ballooning. The best-known balloonists in the world were the Americans John Wise, John LaMountain and Thaddeus S. C. Lowe. The balloons of the period were inflated with coke gas, a moderate lifting medium compared to hydrogen or helium, but with enough lift to obtain the high winds in the atmosphere that would later be known as the Jet Stream.

In 1859, John Wise had built an enormous aerostat that he appropriately named the Atlantic. He invited John LaMountain and a few other passengers to join them at a start point in St. Louis, Missouri. Though intended to cross the Atlantic Ocean, the flight, only lasting a little less than a day ended caught in a sudden windstorm over Lake Ontario and crash-landing in Henderson, New York. Neither Wise nor LaMountain ever attempted a transatlantic flight again.

Professor Thaddeus S. C. Lowe, with a little more scientific approach to an Atlantic crossing prepared a massive balloon of 725,000 cubic feet (20,500 m³) called the City of New York to take off from Philadelphia at a proper season during 1860. He even equipped the rig with a small escape boat towed under the gondola should anything go awry over the ocean. Defeating circumstances, most of them outside the realm of aeronautics, caused postponements until the best time of year ran out. Lowe opted to wait for mid-1861 to attempt the flight, but upon a suggestion from Prof. Joseph Henry at the Smithsonian Institution Lowe took the smaller balloon Enterprise to Cincinnati for a test flight that would return him to the East Coast. The flight, which took off two days after the beginning of the American Civil War, went well short of the fact that Lowe ended up in Confederate South Carolina. Upon returning home he was summoned by Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase to bring his balloon to Washington, D.C. Lowe ended up as Chief Aeronaut of the Union Army Balloon Corps, which all but ended any idea of his making a transatlantic flight.

By airplane

The Anglo-French supersonic transatlantic airliner Concorde

The North Atlantic presented challenges for aviators due to weather and the huge distances involved, with few stopping points. Initial transatlantic services, therefore, focused on the South Atlantic, where a number of French, German, and Italian airlines offered seaplane service for mail between South America and West Africa in the 1930s. From February 1934 to August 1939 Deutsche Lufthansa operated a regular airmail service between Natal, Brazil, and Bathurst, The Gambia, continuing via the Canary Islands and Spain to Stuttgart, Germany. From December 1935, Air France opened a regular weekly airmail route between South America and Africa. German airlines, such as Deutsche Luft Hansa, experimented with mail routes over the North Atlantic in the early 1930s, with seaplanes and dirigibles.

The U.S. was mainly concerned about transatlantic flight for the faster postal service between Europe and America. In 1931 W. Irving Glover, the second assistant postmaster, wrote an article for Popular Mechanics on the challenges and the need for a regular service. The article even mentioned aerial refueling after takeoff as a possible solution.

Pan American World Airways of the United States, Imperial Airways of Britain, Lufthansa of Germany, and Aéropostale of France, began to use flying boats to connect the Americas to Europe via Bermuda and the Azores during the 1930s. A main reason for using flying boats was the lack of runways long enough for large land aircraft. On 26 March 1939 Pan American made its first trial transatlantic flight from Botwood, Newfoundland to Foynes, Ireland, using a Boeing 314 (named Yankee Clipper by PanAm) with a scheduled flight time of about 29 hours. The first scheduled heavier-than-air passenger-carrying flights were Pan American's Boeings in summer 1939.

In 1938 the German Focke-Wulf Fw 200 long range aircraft was introduced making it possible to fly non-stop between Berlin and New York and from Berlin to Tokyo with only one intermediate stopover. This last year prior to the outbreak of World War II turned out to be the most successful one in the history of the airline, with 19.3 million flight kilometres on the scheduled European routes and a total of 254,713 passengers and 5,288 tons of mail transported.

On 1 April 1939, Deutsche Luft Hansa launched scheduled transatlantic flights between Port Natal, South Africa and Santiago de Chile using Fw 200 aircraft, a route which had previously been operated by Syndicato Condor. With Bangkok, Hanoi and Taipeh, further Asian destinations were added to the route network.

During World War II, the crossing of the Atlantic by air became much more commonplace with the instigation of RAF Ferry Command that delivered U.S.- and Canadian-built combat aircraft to the United Kingdom, flying from Gander, Newfoundland, to Prestwick in Scotland. Over the course of the war more than 9,000 aircraft were ferried across the ocean. The Atlantic Division of the United States Army Air Forces Air Transport Command ferried aircraft and carried supplies and passengers from the USA to the British Isles. By the end of the war, crossing the Atlantic had become a routine operation, presaging the inauguration of scheduled commercial air transport services after the war. By then the time for an Atlantic crossing had come down from the 7h 56m achieved earlier in the war by a BOAC Liberator, to the 5h 46m for the de Havilland Mosquito flown by Wing Commander John de Lacy Wooldridge from Goose Bay, Labrador, to the UK.

After World War II long runways were available, and American, Canadian and European carriers such as Pan Am, TWA, Trans Canada Airlines (TCA), BOAC, and Air France acquired larger piston aircraft, which allowed flights over the North Atlantic with intermediate stops (usually in Gander, Newfoundland and/or Shannon, Ireland). To aid aircraft crossing the Atlantic, six nations grouped to divide the Atlantic into ten zones. Each zone had a letter and a vessels station in that zone, providing radio rely, radio navigation beacons, weather reports and coordinated rescues in case an aircraft went down. The six nations of the group split of the cost or maintaining these vessels.

The September 1947 ABC Guide shows 27 passenger flights a week west across the North Atlantic to the US and Canada on BOAC and other European airlines and 151 flights every two weeks on Pan Am, AOA, TWA and TCA. 15 flights a week to the Caribbean and South America, plus three a month on Iberia and a Latecoere 631 six-engine flying boat every two weeks to Fort de France.

Scheduled jet flights began in October 1958, and supersonic service (Concorde) was offered from 1976 to 2003. Since the loosening of regulations in the 1970s and 1980s, a large number of airlines now compete in the transatlantic market.

Transatlantic routes

Unlike over land, transatlantic flights use standardized aircraft routes called North Atlantic Tracks (NATs). These change daily in position (although altitudes are standardized) to compensate for weather—particularly the jet stream tailwinds and headwinds, which may be substantial at cruising altitudes and have a strong influence on trip duration and fuel economy. Eastbound flights generally operate during night-time hours, while westbound flights generally operate during daytime hours, for passenger convenience. For European readers it should be mentioned that the "Eastbound Flow", as it is called, generally makes European landfall from about 0600UT to 0900UT. The westbound flow generally operates within a 1200–1500UT time-slot. Restrictions on how far a given aircraft may be from an airport also play a part in determining its route; in the past, airliners with three or more engines were not restricted, but a twin-engine airliner was required to stay within a certain distance of airports that could accommodate it (since a single engine failure in a four-engine aircraft is less crippling than a single engine failure in a twin). Modern aircraft with two engines flying transatlantic (the most common models used for transatlantic service being the Airbus A330, Boeing 767 and Boeing 777) have to be ETOPS certified.

Gaps in air traffic control and radar coverage over large stretches of the Earth's oceans, as well as an absence of most types of radio navigation aids, impose a requirement for a high level of autonomy in navigation upon transatlantic flights. Aircraft must include reliable systems that can determine the aircraft's course and position with great accuracy over long distances. In addition to the traditional compass, inertials and satellite navigation systems such as GPS all have their place in transatlantic navigation. Land-based systems such as VOR and DME,because they operate "line of sight", are mostly useless for ocean crossings, except in initial and final legs within about 240 nautical miles (440 km) of those facilities. In the late 1950s and early 1960s an important facility for low-flying aircraft was the Radio Range. Inertial Nav. systems became prominent in the 1970s

Busiest Transatlantic Routes

This table is for the busiest commercial routes from North America to Europe

Rank	North American Airport	European Airport	Passengers 2010
1	New York City, JFK	London, Heathrow	2,501,546
2	Los Angeles	London, Heathrow	1,388,367
3	New York City, JFK	Paris, CDG	1,159,089
4	Chicago, O'Hare	London, Heathrow	1,110,231
5	Montreal, Trudeau	Paris, CDG	1,105,007
6	New York City, Newark	London, Heathrow	1,065,842
7	Toronto, Pearson	London, Heathrow	926,239
8	Chicago, O'Hare	Frankfurt	866,733
9	Boston, Logan	London, Heathrow	851,728
10	San Francisco	London, Heathrow	841,549
11	Miami	London, Heathrow	795,014
12	New York City, JFK	Frankfurt	710,876
13	New York City, JFK	Madrid	690,624
14	Washington DC, Dulles	Frankfurt	659,532
15	Orlando	London, Gatwick	648,400
16	New York City, JFK	Rome	563,129
17	Detroit	Amsterdam	613,971
18	Los Angeles	Paris, CDG	558,868
19	San Francisco	Frankfurt	537,888
20	Houston	London, Heathrow	528,987

Early notable transatlantic flights and attempts

Airship America failure

In October 1910, the American journalist, Walter Wellman, who had in 1909 attempted to reach the North Pole by balloon, set out for Europe from Atlantic City in a dirigible, America. A storm off Cape Cod sent him off course, and then engine failure forced him to ditch half way between New York and Bermuda. Wellman, his crew of five – and the balloon's cat – were rescued by RMS Trent, a passing British ship. The Atlantic bid failed, but the distance covered, about 1,000 statute miles (1,600 km), was at the time a record for a dirigible.

US Navy warships "strung out like a string of pearls" along the NC's flightpath (3rd leg)

First transatlantic flight

On 8–31 May 1919, the U.S. Navy Curtiss NC-4 flying boats under the command of Albert Read, flew 4,526 statute miles (7,284 km) from Rockaway, New York, to Plymouth (England), via inter alia Trepassey (Newfoundland), Horta and Ponta Delgada (both Azores) and Lisbon (Portugal) in 53h 58m, spread over 23 days. The crossing from Newfoundland to the European mainland had taken 10 days 22 hours, with the total time in flight of 26h 46m. The longest non-stop leg of the journey, from Trepassey, Newfoundland, to Horta in the Azores, was 1,200 statute miles (1,900 km) and lasted 15h 18m.

Sopwith Atlantic failure

On 18 May 1919, the Australian Harry Hawker, together with navigator Kenneth Mackenzie Grieve, attempted to become the first to achieve a non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. They set off from Mount Pearl, Newfoundland, in the Sopwith Atlantic biplane. After fourteen and a half hours of flight the engine overheated and they were forced to divert towards the shipping lanes: they found a passing freighter, the Danish Mary, established contact and crash-landed ahead of her. Mary's radio was out of order, so that it was not until six days later when the boat reached Scotland that word was received that they were safe. The wheels from the undercarriage, jettisoned soon after takeoff were later recovered by local fishermen and are now in the Newfoundland Museum in St. John's.

Alcock and Brown's Vickers Vimy takes off from Newfoundland.

First non-stop transatlantic flight

On 14–15 June 1919, Capt. John Alcock and Lieut. Arthur Whitten Brown of the United Kingdom in Vickers Vimy bomber, between islands, 1,960 nautical miles (3,630 km), from St. John's, Newfoundland, to Clifden, Ireland, in 16h 12m.

First east-to-west transatlantic flight

On 2 July 1919, Major George Herbert Scott of the Royal Air Force with his crew and passengers flies from RAF East Fortune, Scotland to Mineola, New York (on Long Island) in airship R34, covering a distance of about 3,000 statute miles (4,800 km) in about four and a half days. R34 then made the return trip to England arriving at RNAS Pulham in 75 hours, thus also completing the first double crossing of the Atlantic (east-west-east).

First flight across the South Atlantic

On 30 March–17 June 1922, Lieutenant Commander Sacadura Cabral and Commander Gago Coutinho of Portugal, using three Fairey IIID floatplanes (Lusitania, Portugal, and Santa Cruz), after two ditchings, with only internal means of navigation (the Coutinho-invented sextant with artificial horizon) from Lisbon, Portugal, to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

First non-stop aircraft flight between European and American mainlands

In October 1924, The Zeppelin ZR-3 (LZ-126), flew from Germany to New Jersey with a crew commanded by Dr. Hugo Eckener, covering a distance of about 4,000 statute miles (6,400 km).

First flight across the South Atlantic made by a Non-European crew

On 28 April 1927, Brazilian João Ribeiro de Barros with the assistance of João Negrão (co-pilot), Newton Braga (navigator) and Vasco Cinquini (mechanic), crossed the Atlantic in the hydroplane Jahú. The four aviators departed from Genoa, in Italy, to Santo Amaro (São Paulo), making stops in Spain, Gibraltar, Cabo Verde and Fernando de Noronha, in the Brazilian territory.

Disappearance of L'Oiseau Blanc

On 8–9 May 1927, Charles Nungesser and François Coli attempted to cross the Atlantic from Paris to the USA in a Levasseur PL-8 biplane L'Oiseau Blanc ("The White Bird"), but were lost.

First solo transatlantic flight and first non-stop fixed-wing aircraft flight between America and mainland Europe

On 20–21 May 1927, Charles A. Lindbergh flies Ryan monoplane (named Spirit of St. Louis), 3,600 nautical miles (6,700 km), from Roosevelt Field, New York to Paris–Le Bourget Airport, in 33½ hours. The flight was timed by the Longines watch company.

First transatlantic air passenger

On 4–6 June 1927, the first transatlantic air passenger was Charles A. Levine. He was carried as a passenger by Clarence D. Chamberlin from Roosevelt Field, New York, to Eisleben, Germany, in a Wright-powered Bellanca.

First non-stop air crossing of the South Atlantic

On 14–15 October 1927, Dieudonne Costes and Joseph le Brix, flying a Breguet 19, flew from Senegal to Brazil.

First non-stop fixed-wing aircraft westbound flight over the North Atlantic

On 12–13 April 1928, Gunther von Huenfeld and Capt. Hermann Köhl of Germany and Comdr. James Fitzmaurice of Ireland, flew a Junkers W33 monoplane (named Bremen), 2,070 statute miles (3,330 km), from Baldonnell near Dublin, Ireland to Labrador, in 36½ hours.

First crossing of the Atlantic by a woman

On 17–18 June 1928, Amelia Earhart was a passenger of an aircraft piloted by Wilmer Stultz. Since most of the flight was on instruments for which Earhart had no training, she did not pilot the aircraft. Interviewed after landing, she said, "Stultz did all the flying — had to. I was just baggage, like a sack of potatoes. Maybe someday I'll try it alone."

Notable flight (around the world)

On 1–8 August 1929, in making the circumnavigation, Dr Hugo Eckener piloted the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin across the Atlantic three times: from Germany 4,391 statute miles (7,067 km) east to west in four days from August1 ; return 4,391 statute miles (7,067 km) west to east in two days from 8 August; after completing the circumnavigation to Lakehurst a final 4,391 statute miles (7,067 km) west to east landing 4 September, making three crossings in 34 days.

First scheduled transatlantic passenger flights

From 1931 onwards, the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin operated the world's first scheduled transatlantic passenger flights, mainly between Germany and Brazil (64 such round trips overall) sometimes stopping in Spain, Miami, London, and Berlin.

First nonstop east-to-west fixed-wing aircraft flight between European and American mainlands

On 1–2 September 1930, Dieudonne Costes and Maurice Bellonte flew a Breguet 19 Super Bidon biplane (named Point d'Interrogation, Question Mark), 6,200 km from Paris to New York City.

Notable flight (around the world)

On 23 June–1 July 1931, Wiley Post and Harold Gatty in a Lockheed Vega monoplane (named Winnie Mae), 15,477 nm (28,663 km) flew from Long Island in 8d 15h 51m, with 14 stops, with a total flying time 107h 2m.

First solo crossing of the Atlantic by a woman

On 20 May 1932, Amelia Earhart set off from Harbour Grace, Newfoundland, intending to fly to Paris in her single engine Lockheed Vega 5b to emulate Charles Lindbergh's solo flight. After encountering storms and a burnt exhaust pipe, Earhart landed in a pasture at Culmore, north of Derry, Northern Ireland, ending a flight lasting 14h 56m.

First solo westbound crossing of the Atlantic

On 18–19 August 1932, Jim Mollison, flying a de Havilland Puss Moth, flew from Dublin to New Brunswick.

Lightest (empty weight) aircraft that crossed the Atlantic

On 7–8 May 1933, Stanisław Skarżyński made a solo flight across the South Atlantic, covering 3,582 kilometres (2,226 mi), in a RWD-5bis - empty weight below 450 kilograms (990 lb). If considering the total takeoff weight (as per FAI records) then there is a longer distance Atlantic crossing: the distance world record holder, Piper PA-24 Comanche in this class, 1000–1750 kg. [1].

Mass flight

mass transatlantic flight: On 1–15 July 1933, Gen. Italo Balbo of Italy led 24 Savoia-Marchetti S.55X seaplanes 6,100 statute miles (9,800 km), in a flight from Orbetello, Italy, to Chicago, Illinois, in 47h 52m.

First around the world solo flight

On 15–22 July 1933, Wiley Post flew Lockheed Vega monoplane Winnie Mae 15,596 statute miles (25,099 km) in 7d 8h 49m, with 11 stops; flying time, 115h 36mi.

First solo westbound crossing of the Atlantic by a woman and first person to solo westbound from England

On 4-5 September 1936, Beryl Markham, flying a Vega Gull from Abingdon, England intended to fly to New York, but was forced down at Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, due to icing of fuel tank vents.

First transatlantic passenger service on heavier-than air aircraft

on June 24, 1939, Pan American inaugurated transatlantic passenger service between New York and Marseilles, France, using Boeing 314 flying boats. On 8 July 1939, a service began between New York and Southampton as well. A single fare was US$375 — equivalent to $5,300 today. Scheduled landplane flights started in October 1945.

First transatlantic flight of non-rigid airships

On 1 June 1944, two K class blimps from Blimp Squadron 14 of the United States Navy (USN) completed the first transatlantic crossing by non-rigid airships. On 28 May 1944, the two K-ships (K-123 and K-130) left South Weymouth, Massachusetts, and flew approximately 16 hours to Naval Station Argentia, Newfoundland. From Argentia, the blimps flew approximately 22 hours to Lajes Field on Terceira Island in the Azores. The final leg of the first transatlantic crossing was about a 20-hour flight from the Azores to Craw Field in Port Lyautey (Kenitra), French Morocco.

First jet aircraft to cross the Atlantic Ocean

On 14 July 1948, six de Havilland Vampire F3s of No. 54 Squadron RAF, commanded by Wing Commander D S Wilson-MacDonald, DSO, DFC, flew via Stornoway, Iceland, and Labrador to Montreal on the first leg of a goodwill tour of the U.S. and Canada.

First jet aircraft to make a non-stop transatlantic flight

On 21 February 1951, an RAF English Electric Canberra B Mk 2 (serial number WD932) flown by Squadron Leader A Callard of the A&AEE, flew from Aldergrove Northern Ireland, to Gander, Newfoundland. The flight covered almost 1,800 nautical miles (3,300 km) in 4h 37 m. The aircraft was being flown to the U.S. to act as a pattern aircraft for the Martin B-57 Canberra.

First jet aircraft transatlantic passenger service

On 4 October 1958, British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) flew the first jet airliner service using the de Havilland Comet, when G-APDC initiated the first transatlantic Comet 4 service and the first scheduled transatlantic passenger jet service in history, flying from London to New York with a stopover at Gander.

Other early transatlantic flights

• 29 June–1 July 1927: Admiral Richard Byrd with crew flew Fokker F.VIIa/3m America from New York City to France.
• 13 July 1928: Ludwik Idzikowski and Kazimierz Kubala attempt a crossing of the Atlantic westbound from Paris to the USA in an Amiot 123 biplane, but crash in the Azores.
• 6–9 February 1933. Jim Mollison flew a Puss Moth from Senegal to Brazil, across South Atlantic, becoming the first person to fly solo across the North and South Atlantics.
• 15–17 July 1933: Lithuanians Steponas Darius and Stasys Girėnas were supposed to make a non-stop flight from New York City via Newfoundland to Kaunas in their aircraft named Lituanica, but crashed in the forests of Germany after 6,411 km of flying, only 650 km short of their final destination after a flying time 37 hours, 11 minutes. They carried the first transatlantic airmail consignment.
• 5 July 1937: Captain Harold Gray of Pan Am flew from Botwood, Newfoundland to Foynes, Ireland, in a Sikorsky S-42 flying boat as part of the first transatlantic commercial passenger test flights. On 6 July 1937, Captain Arthur Wilcockson of Imperial Airways flew from Foynes to Botwood, in a Short Empire class flying boat named Caledonia.
• 21 July 1938: The Short Mercury flew from Foynes, on the west coast of Ireland, to Boucherville, Montreal, Canada, a flight of 2,930 statute miles (4,720 km). The Short Maia, flown by Captain A.S. Wilcockson, took off carrying Mercury (piloted by Captain, later Air Vice Marshal Don Bennett).Mercury separated from the carrier aircraft to continue what was to become the first commercial non-stop east-to-west transatlantic flight by a heavier-than-air machine. This initial journey took 20 hrs 21 min at an average ground speed of 144 mph (232 km/h).
• 10 August 1938: The first non-stop flight from Berlin to New York was with a Focke-Wulf Fw 200 that flew Staaken to Floyd Bennett in 24 hours, 56 minutes and did the return flight three days later in 19 hours, 47 minutes.

Notable transatlantic flights of the 21st century

The prototype Sling 4 Light Sport Aircraft on arrival at Stellenbosch, Western Cape, South Africa

• 2 May 2002: Lindbergh's grandson, Erik Lindbergh, celebrated the 75th anniversary of the pioneering 1927 flight of the Spirit of St. Louis by duplicating the journey in a single engine, two seat Lancair Columbia 200. The younger Lindbergh's solo flight from Republic Airport on Long Island, to Le Bourget Airport in Paris was completed in 17 hours and 7 minutes, or just a little more than half the time of his grandfather's 33.5 hour original flight.
• 22–23 September 2011: Mike Blyth and Jean d'Assonville flew a Sling 4 prototype Light Sport Aircraft, registration ZU-TAF, non-stop from Cabo Frio International Airport, Brazil to Cape Town International Airport, South Africa, a distance of 6,222km, in 27 hours. The crew set course for co-ordinates 34°S 31°W to take advantage of the westerly winds and at the turning point proceeded in an easterly direction, roughly following the 35°S parallel. This took them within 140 km north of the most remote inhabited island in the world, Tristan da Cunha. The Cabo Frio/Cape Town leg was part of an around the world flight.

References

Bibliography

• Davies, R.E.G. Pan Am: An Airline and its Aircraft. New York: Orion Books, 1987. ISBN 0-517-56639-7.
• Yenne, Bill. Seaplanes & Flying Boats: A Timeless Collection from Aviation's Golden Age. New York: BCL Press, 2003. ISBN 1-932302-03-4.

External links

• Current North Atlantic Weather and Tracks
• How The Vampires Crossed - a 1948 Flight article on the first jet crossing of the Atlantic