2009 – Deceased: British World War I veteran and last surviving founder member of the Royal Air Force, Henry Allingham, 113.
2009 – A United States Air Force McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle from the 336th Fighter Squadron, based at Seymour Johnson AFB, North Carolina, flying in support of ISAF coalition operations, crashes in eastern Afghanistan. The two aircrew, Capt. Thomas J. Gramith and Capt. Mark R. McDowell both die in the incident.
2007 – An Antonov An-24 of Malift Air shortly after taking off from Bandundu, DRC had an engine failure, lost altitude and crashed 8 km from Bandundu. Of the 2 crew and 8 passengers, all survived.
2005 – A Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet and a Boeing F/A-18F Super Hornet from NAS Lemoore, California, collide over the China Lake, California, weapons testing ground. The pilot of the E is KWF, while the two crew of F eject with injuries.
1984 – Beverly Lynn Burns becomes the first female Boeing 747 airline captain, flying PEOPLExpress flight 604 from Newark to LAX. The achievement earned her extensive media attention, congratulatory honors from several local politicians – And even an invitation to President Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration. By the time she retired from Continental in 2008, she had captained the 727, 737, 747, 757, 767, 777 and DC-10.
1974 – NASA buys a Boeing 747 from American Airlines, and under a $30 million contract from Rockwell International, Boeing begins modifying it into the first Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.
1966 – Gemini 10, the first mission to complete a double rendezvous with other spacecraft, is launched from Cape Canaveral.
1966 – A fuel tank on a Boeing B-52D Stratofortress of the 509th Bombardment Wing (Heavy) out of Pease AFB, New Hampshire, comes off and lands 4,000 feet up on Sugarloaf Mountain in Kingfield, Maine.
1965 – The first Russian satellite to complete a lunar flyby, Zond 3, is launched.
1960 – RCAF Douglas DC-4 Ms started the airlift of 22 tons to assist in UN operations in the Republic of the Congo.
1957 – The 380th Bomb Wing suffers its first peacetime major accident when Boeing KC-97G-28-BO Stratotanker, 52-2737, c/n 16768, from the 380th Air Refueling Squadron with a crew of eight explodes and crashes into Lake Champlain at 2128 hrs. when 2 of the 4 engines fail 3 minutes after take-off from Plattsburgh AFB, New York. Three survivors.
1956 – The first Boeing KC-135 rolls out from the Renton plant, followed a few minutes later by the last KC-97.
1950 – AD Skyraiders and F4U Corsairs from the aircraft carrier USS Valley Forge (CV-45) strike targets near Pyongyang, Korea, then completely destroy an oil refinery at Wonsan. Aircraft from HMS Triumph provide a combat air patrol and antisubmarine patrols for Task Force 77 during the strikes.
1950 – The Peruvian Aviation Corps is reorganized to become the Peruvian Air Force.
1945 – Task Force 38 carrier aircraft conduct heavy strikes against targets along the shore of Tokyo Bay, concentrating on the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal, where they damage the battleship Nagato and sink a submarine, a destroyer, and three smaller vessels.
1945 – Consolidated TBY-2 Seawolf, BuNo 30414, overshoots runway while landing at Convair Field, Fort Worth, Texas. Two KWF.
1944 – At 7.15 am on 18 July 1944 a Lancaster Mk.111 bomber belonging to 115 Squadron RAF crashed into the farm house at West End Farm (51°56′03″N 0°20′35″W) killing the crew as well as the farmer’s wife and two daughters (one of whom was home on leave from the Auxiliary Territorial Service). The aircraft LM616 (KO J) had left its base at RAF Witchford near Ely several hours earlier to support Allied ground forces taking part in Operation Goodwood during the Normandy campaign. The Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Forces objective was to bomb units of the 16th Luftwaffe Field Division and the 21st Panzer Division which were located around the Manneville area in France. LM616 received severe damage during the raid, in which its controls and navigation aids were shot up. The aircraft had descended through low cloud only to see the high escarpment of the Chiltern Hills at Offley loom into view too late for the crew to take immediate action. The aircraft hit trees in a wood on top of Birkitt Hill before colliding with the farm house at West End Farm.
1944 – Hauptman Werner Thierfelder, unit commander of Erprobungskommando 262, out of Lechfeld, is lost in crash of Me 262A-1a under unclear circumstances. Luftwaffe records indicate that he was shot down but U.S. and British records show no comparable engagement. A possible cause is that Thierfelder exceeded the airframe's limiting Mach number in a dive, perhaps while pursuing an Allied reconnaissance aircraft, leading to an irrecoverable dive.
1943 – US Navy airship US airship K-74| is shot down by a German submarine, the only airship lost to enemy fire during World War II.
1943 – Six Eleventh Air Force B-24 s make the first confirmed Allied strike against the Kurile Islands, damaging the Japanese base at Paramushiro and claiming a ship sunk without suffering any losses. It is the first time since the Doolittle Raid of April 1942 that Allied aircraft have struck the inner portions of the Japanese Empire.
1942 – A Messerschmitt Me 262 prototype makes its first flight under jet power, test-piloted by Fritz Wendel. Previous flights had been driven by a propeller.
1941 – The first Boeing B-17 s fly into combat, serving with the British Royal Air Force on a daylight bombing raid from 30,000 feet against Wilhelmshaven, Germany.
1940 – First successful helicopter flight in the US, Stratford, Ct. in the Vought-Sikorsky US-300.
1937 – Supporting Nationalist forces, German fighters of the Condor Legion begin to dominate the air over the Battle of Brunete, shooting down 21 Republican aircraft during the day. The Nationalists will hold the advantage in the air over central Spain for the rest of the Spanish Civil War.
1919 – Riding as a passenger, Raymonde de Laroche dies along with the pilot in the crash of an experimental Caudron airplane at Le Crotoy airfield in France.
1914 – The United States Congress creates an Aviation Section in the United States Army Signal Corps.
1905 – Daniel Maloney makes a launch in a tandem-wing glider designed by John Montgomery at Santa Clara, California. However, a balloon cable damages the glider and upon release Maloney and the aircraft fall uncontrolled to the ground, leading to Maloney’s death.
1803, Etienne Gaspar Robertson and Lhoest climb from Hamburg (Germany) up to 7,280 m in a balloon.
