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On This Day: August 3

Aviation events for August 3

1861: John La Mountain becomes the first balloonist to use boats for aerial operations in a military conflict. Using the Union tug Fanny, he ascends from its deck to a height of 2,000 ft. to conduct aerial reconnaissance of Confederate forces during America’s Civil War.
 
1904: In a dirigible named California Arrow, Thomas Scott Baldwin carries out the first circular flight by an airship in America. Powered by a converted motorcycle engine, it is built and dispatched by Glenn Curtiss.
 
1921: Lieutenant John A. Macready of the U.S. Army Air Corps finds a new use for airplanes when he sprays a patch of ground infested with caterpillars. This practice becomes known as crop dusting.
 
1955: President Eisenhower signs the Civilian Airport Modernization Bill. The legislation establishes a long-term program of federal government aid toward the construction of airports in the United States.
 
1975: The worst accident ever involving a Boeing 707 occurs in Morocco as a chartered Alia Royal Jordanian flight crashes on approach to Agadir-Inezgane Airport (AGA), killing all 188 on board. The plane, registration JY-AEE (formerly N797PA, Pan Am’s “Clipper Northwind”) had apparently strayed from its prescribed course as it began its descent, leading to its right wing and no. 4 engine hitting a ridge at approximately 2,500 feet. Read more...
 
1981: in what would become a historical milestone in 20th century labor relations, roughly 13,000 of the 17,500 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) walk out from their jobs in America’s airport control towers in an attempt to cripple the nation’s transportation system and force the Federal government to accede to their contract demands. President Ronald Reagan would respond with a hardline stance, declaring their illegal strike a “peril to national safety” and ordering them back to work within 48 hours or face termination from their jobs. All but 1,300 controllers take a bet that the president is bluffing–and they lose–when on August 5th, Reagan fires the 11,345 controllers who continued to strike and permanently bans them from federal service. By replacing the fired controllers with non-union controllers, supervisors, and military controllers, as well as cutting in half the number of flights during peak periods, the FAA’s strike contingency plan would turn out to be a success. Public support for the fired controllers is low, as they had already been paid well above most Americans prior to the strike, and their contract demands would have earned them significantly more money while requiring they do less work. The union would be decertified a few months later.
 
1994: Terrorists set off a bomb at Madras Airport (MAA), killing 32 people.
 
1994: King Hussein of Jordan, a licensed pilot, flies his Lockheed L-1011 over Jerusalem, marking the first Jordanian overflight of Israeli airspace.
 
United Airlines Boeing 737-924(ER) (N75436) at  Ft. Lauderdale - International, United States
2000: First flight of the Boeing 737-900. Read more...
 
2007: First flight of the Northrop Grumman E-2D Hawkeye. Read more...
 
 
 

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