1784: The largest hot-air balloon ever made, called Le Flesselle by the Montgolfier brothers, makes an ascent at Lyons, France. The balloon’s capacity is 700,000 cubic feet and it goes up to 3,000 feet.

1915: First German aerial bombing of Britain, by two Zeppelins, thereby opening up a new era in the exploitation of aeronautics. During World War I, a total of 56 tons of aerial bombs was dropped on London and 214 tons on the rest of Britain.

1918: U.S. School of Aviation Medicine began operations under Maj. Williams H. Wilmer, Signal Corps, Hazelhurst Field, Mineola, N.Y. A low-pressure tank was constructed to simulate altitudes up to 30,000 feet, and some studies were conducted at Pikes Peak.

1946: First flight of the Bell X-1 (unpowered).

1950: First flight of the Avro Canada CF-100 RCAF 18101.

1959: The AEC demonstrated a 5-watt radioisotope thermoelectric generator (designated SNAP 3) to President Eisenhower as an example of the potential use of radioisotopes and static thermoelectric conversion for providing long-lived electric power for space.

1961: Report of the Space Science Board of the National Academy of Sciences stated that life in some form on other planets of the solar system may possibly exist, but that evidence of this is not available today.

1961: Iris rocket, new solid-propellant single-stage sounding rocket, failed to attain programmed flight from Wallops Island, reaching only 86 miles' altitude instead of 160 miles.

1961: NASA selected Hughes Aircraft Co. for placing of a major subcontract by Jet Propulsion Laboratory to build seven Surveyor spacecraft designed for soft landings on the Moon.

1961: Marshall Space Flight Center awarded contract to Douglas and Chance Vought to study launching manned exploratory expedition into lunar and interplanetary space from Earth orbits.

1961: Federal Communications Commission allocated a radio frequency to the American Telephone & Telegraph Co. to establish the first space satellite communications link between Europe and the United States on an experimental basis, a program calling for NASA launching of a series of experimental communication satellites capable of relaying telephone calls, television programs, and other messages across the Atlantic.

1961: NASA announced indefinite suspension of the programming of the wide-angle camera in Tiros II, the experimental weather observation satellite launched on November 23, 1960.

2006: Jet Airways announces its purchase of Air Sahara, creating the largest domestic airline in India.