Fighter aircraft

255 Pages·2011·19.43 MB·English

Revised Edition: 2016
ISBN 978-1-280-13561-3
© All rights reserved.
Published by:
College Publishing House
48 West 48 Street, Suite 1116,
New York, NY 10036, United States
Email: [email protected]
Table of Contents

Chapter 1 - Aviation History
Chapter 2 - Airline and Civil Aviation
Chapter 3 - Helicopter
Chapter 4 - Air Traffic Control
Chapter 5 - Aviation and the Environment
Chapter 6 - Aerial Warfare
Chapter 7 - Military Aviation
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Chapter-1
Aviation History

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French reconnaissance balloon L'Intrépide of 1796, the oldest existing flying device, in
the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna

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Leonardo da Vinci's "aerial screw" design.

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Leonardo da Vinci's Ornithopter design.
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Aviation history refers to the history of development of mechanical flight—from the
earliest attempts in kites and gliders to powered heavier-than-air, supersonic and
spaceflights.
The first form of man-made flying objects were kites. The earliest known record of kite
flying is from around 200 B.C. in China, when a General flew a kite over enemy territory
to calculate the length of tunnel required to enter the region. Yuan Huangtou, a Chinese
prince, survived by tying himself to the kite.
Leonardo da Vinci's (15th c.) dream of flight found expression in several designs, but he
did not attempt to demonstrate flight by literally constructing them.
With the efforts to analyze the atmosphere in the 17th and 18th century, gases such as
hydrogen were discovered which in turn led to the invention of hydrogen balloons.
Various theories in mechanics by physicists during the same period of time—notably
fluid dynamics and Newton's laws of motion—led to the foundation of modern
aerodynamics. Tethered balloons filled with hot air were used in the first half of the 19th
century and saw considerable action in several mid-century wars, most notably the
American Civil War, where balloons provided observation during the Battle of
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Petersburg.
Experiments with gliders laid a groundwork to build heavier-than-air craft, and by the
early 20th century advancements in engine technology and aerodynamics made
controlled, powered flight possible for the first time.
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Mythology
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Daedalus working on Icarus' wings. Illustration from a relief in Villa Albani, Rome, 1st-
2nd century CE.
Human ambition to fly is illustrated in mythological literature of several cultures; the
wings made out of wax and feathers by Daedalus in Greek mythology, or the Pushpaka
Vimana of king Ravana in Ramayana, for instance.
Early attempts
Flight automaton in Greece
Around 400 B.C., Archytas, the Greek philosopher, mathematician, astronomer,
statesman and strategist, designed and built a bird-shaped, apparently steam powered
model named "The Pigeon" (Greek: Περιστέρα "Peristera"), which is said to have flown
some 200 meters. According to Aulus Gellius, the mechanical bird was suspended on a
string or pivot and was powered by a "concealed aura or spirit".
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Hot air balloons and kites in China
The Kongming lantern (proto hot air balloon) was known in China from ancient times. Its
invention is usually attributed to the general Zhuge Liang (180–234 AD, honorific title
Kongming), who is said to have used them to scare the enemy troops:
An oil lamp was installed under a large paper bag, and the bag floated in the air due to the
lamp heating the air. ... The enemy was frightened by the light in the air, thinking that
some divine force was helping him.
However, the device based on a lamp in a paper shell is documented earlier, and
according to Joseph Needham, hot-air balloons in China were known from the 3rd
century BC.
In the 5th century BCE Lu Ban invented a 'wooden bird' which may have been a large
kite, or which may have been an early glider.
During the Yuan dynasty (13th c.) under rulers like Kublai Khan, the rectangular lamps
became popular in festivals, when they would attract huge crowds. During the Mongol
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Empire, the design may have spread along the Silk Route into Central Asia and the
Middle East. Almost identical floating lights with a rectangular lamp in thin paper
scaffolding are common in Tibetan celebrations and in the Indian festival of lights,
Diwali. However, there is no evidence that these were used for human flight.
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Gliders in Europe
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Stained glass window showing Eilmer, installed in Malmesbury Abbey in 1920
In the 9th century, at the age of 65, the Berber polymath Ibn Firnas is said to have flown
from the hill Jabal al-'arus by employing a rudimentary glider. While "alighting again on
the place whence he had started," he eventually crashed and sustained injury which some
contemporary critics attributed to a lack of tail. However, the only source describing the
event is from the 17th century.
Between 1000 and 1010, the English Benedictine monk Eilmer of Malmesbury flew for
about 200 meters using a glider (circa 1010), but sustained injuries, too. The event is
recorded in the work of the eminent medieval historian William of Malmesbury in about
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1125. Being a fellow monk in the same abbey, William almost certainly obtained his
account directly from people there who knew Eilmer himself.
From Renaissance to the 18th century
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Leonardo da Vinci's Ornithopter wings
Some six centuries after Ibn Firnas, Leonardo da Vinci developed a hang glider design in
which the inner parts of the wings are fixed, and some control surfaces are provided
towards the tips (as in the gliding flight in birds). While his drawings exist and are
deemed flightworthy in principle, he himself never flew in it. Based on his drawings, and
using materials that would have been available to him, a prototype constructed in the late
20th century was shown to fly. However, his sketchy design was interpreted with modern
knowledge of aerodynamic principles, and whether his actual ideas would have flown is
not known. A model he built for a test flight in 1496 did not fly, and some other designs,
such as the four-person screw-type helicopter have severe flaws.
In 1670 Francesco Lana de Terzi published work that suggested lighter than air flight
would be possible by having copper foil spheres that contained a vacuum that would be
lighter than the displaced air, lift an airship (rather literal from his drawing). While not
being completely off the mark, he did fail to realize that the pressure of the surrounding
air would smash the spheres.
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