Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 20

July 20

• 2012 – A Royal Brunei Air Force Bell 212 crashed near Kuala Belait, Brunei killing 12 of the 14 on board.

• 2009 – An IAI Kfir jet fighter crashes near the city of Cartagena, Colombia. The Israeli pilots operating the plane were unharmed in the incident, but the jet itself was destroyed. Israel Aerospace Industries said in a statement that the plane was flying a refresher flight, and that the aircraft did not come to a stop on the landing strip, landing outside it. The director of the Israel Aerospace Industries announced that an investigation into the incident had already begun and that a panel to probe the crash had been appointed.

• 2009 – A Chilean Air Force Extra 300L aerobatic aircraft cashed 15 km south of Santiago, Chile, pilot seriously injured.

• 2009 – A Royal Air Force Panavia Tornado GR.4 operating with RAF No. 1 Squadron crashes on take-off at Kandahār International Airport in Afghanistan and the two crew members successfully eject from the aircraft.

• 2008 – (20–26) 16th FAI World Rally Flying Championship

• 2007 – First flight of the Boeing X-48

• 2005 – First flight of the Grob G180 SPn

• 1992 – Round World Air Race begins in Paris.

• 1992 – An Bell-Boeing MV-22 Osprey prototype, BuNo 163914, arriving from Eglin AFB, Florida, catches fire and falls into the Potomac River at MCAS Quantico, Virginia, USA, killing 5 crew members in front of an audience of high-ranking US government officials; this is the first of a series of fatal accidents involving the controversial tiltrotor aircraft.

• 1981 – Somali Airlines Flight 40, a Fokker F27 Friendship, crashed shortly after takeoff from Mogadishu International Airport. All 50 passengers and crew on board were killed.

• 1976 – America’s Viking I robot spacecraft made a successful, first-ever landing on Mars.

• 1974 – The Turkish Air Force supports Operation Atilla, a Turkish invasion of Cyprus, as a war over the island between Turkey and Greece and the Greek Cypriots breaks out. Turkish aircraft join with Turkish Navy in sinking a Greek Cypriot torpedo boat which attempts to attack the approaching Turkish naval flotilla, and Turkish aircraft support the amphibious landing.

• 1972 – Lockheed SR-71A, 61-7978, Article 2029, lost in landing accident at Kadena Air Base, Okinawa. Pilot Capt. Dennis K. Bush and RSO Jimmy Fagg are unhurt.

• 1971 – First flight of the Mitsubishi T-2

• 1969 – Neil Armstrong is the first man to walk on the moon.

• 1956 – First flight of the Aerotécnica AC-12

• 1951 – First flight of the Hawker Hunter

• 1948 – Sixteen Lockheed Shooting Stars complete the first west to east transatlantic flight by jet aircraft.

• 1945 – 473 B-29 s drop 3,255 tons (2,952,917 kg) of bombs on Fukui and other cities in Japan.

• 1944 – Saipan-based U. S. Navy PB4Y-1 Liberators of Bomber Squadron 109 (VB-109) again strike Iwo Jima, Chichi Jima, and Haha Jima. During the strikes of July 14, 15, and 20, they claim between 10 and 30 Japanese aircraft destroyed on the ground.

• 1944 – Flying Fortresses of US 8th Air Force attack Leipzig / Dessau.

• 1944 – Japanese aircraft carrier Hijo sinks by US air attack.

• 1944 – Liberators of US 8th Air Force attack Gotha Russelsheim / Eisenach.

• 1944 – US 15th Air Force attacks Friedrichshaven Memmingen.

• 1943 – U. S. aircraft strike the escorts of a Japanese convoy in New Georgia Sound, sinking two destroyers and damaging the heavy cruiser Kumano.

• 1940 – The British Commonwealth Air Training Plan began operations when students started training at No. 1 Service Flying Training School at Camp Borden, Ontario.

• 1940 – Fleet Air Arm Swordfish of No. 813 Squadron conduct another torpedo strike against Tobruk, sinking two Italian destroyers.

• 1939 – Canada’s first North American Harvards No.’s 1321 & 1322 were delivered to RCAF Sea IsIand.

• 1939 – First flight of the Heinkel He 176 was on 20 Jun 1939.

• 1936 – Twenty Junkers Ju 52s ferry Spanish Nationalist troops from Morocco to Spain in the world's first major military airlift.

• 1930 – July 20-August 1, 7560 km race over Europe of the Challenge 1930 contest.

• 1927 – Lindbergh begins NY flight (Spirit of St Louis).

• 1925 – First flight of the Boeing Model 40

• 1908 – Orville Wright warns Glenn Curtiss that the wing flaps used in the AEA’s June Bug are an infringement of the Wrights’ patent.