1908: The first European flight of over 15 minutes takes place. Léon Delagrange flies his Voisin-Delagrange in France.

1912: Wilbur Wright dies of typhoid fever at the early age of 45. His death marks the end of his extraordinary partnership with his brother Orville, which culminated in 1903 with the first true powered flight in history.

1949: The first use of a Martin-Baker ejection seat in a genuine emergency occurs when pilot J. O. Lancaster ejects himself from the Armstrong Whitworth “flying wing” jet airplane. The seat worked perfectly well.

1971: Mariner 9, USA Mars Orbiter, launched. Mariner 9 arrived at Mars on November 3, 1971 and was placed into orbit on November 24. This was the first US spacecraft to enter an orbit around a planet other than the Moon. At the time of its arrival a huge dust storm was in progress on the planet. Many of the scientific experiments were delayed until the storm had subsided. The first hi-resolution images of the moons Phobos and Deimos were taken. River and channel like features were discovered. Mariner 9 is still in Martian orbit.

1972: First flight of the Northrop YA-9 71-1367.

1974: The Airbus A300 enters service with Air France.

2003: The final commercial flight of an Air France Concorde takes place.

2008: Silverjet ceases operations.

2008: TACA Flight 390, an Airbus A320-233, crashed in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, with 5 casualties (two on the ground) and 65 injuries.