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On This Day: 1939

Aviation events for 1939

February 9: British flyer Alex Henshaw lands his Percival Mew Gull at Gravesend in Kent, England, after a record flight to Cape Town and back in 4 days 10 hours and 20 minutes.
 
February 11: The XP-38, later to become the P-38 Lightning, flies from California to New York in 7 hours, 2 minutes.
 
March 18: Three months after its first flight, a Boeing 307 Stratoliner crashes on Mount Rainier during a test-flight. The crash kills 10 people, including Boeing’s Chief Engineer.
 
March 24: American woman air record-breaker Jacqueline Cochran achieves a woman’s altitude record of 30,052 ft. 5 in. over Palm Spring, California in a Beechcraft Model 17.
 
March 30: Piloted by Flugkapitän Hans Dieterle, the Heinkel He 100 V8/R (serial no. D-IDGH) seizes the absolute world air speed record from Hermann Wurster, who has flown his Bf 109 to 379 mph. The pilot achieves four legs of a course at Oranienburg to record an average speed of 463.92 mph, adding 70 mph to the previous record.
 
April 23: The U.S. Civil Aeronautics Authority raises the eligibility age for obtaining a private pilot license to 18 years from the previous 16 years of age.
 
May 24: The English Imperial Airways Short Seaplane Cabot is successfully refueled in mid-air by a Handley Page bomber modified to carry 891 gallons of aviation fuel.
 
June 18: The first direct transatlantic seaplane service is begun by Pan American Airways. It flies from New York to Southampton, England, by way of Botwood, Newfoundland, and Foynes, Ireland.
 
June 19: The first direct transatlantic seaplane service is begun by Pan American Airways. It flies from New York to Southampton, England, by way of Botwood, Newfoundland, and Foynes, Ireland.
 
June 19: The first direct transatlantic seaplane service is begun by Pan American Airways. It flies from New York to Southampton, England, by way of Botwood, Newfoundland, and Foynes, Ireland.
 
August 27: The first fully jet-propelled aircraft to fly is Germany’s Heinkel 178. A centrifugal flow turbojet engine powers it.
 
September 1: Hitler invades Poland, Beginning of World War 2.
 
September 14: Igor Sikorsky pilots the first practical helicopter, the VS-300.
 
October 15: New York mayor Fiorello La Guardia dedicates an airport in Flushing bearing his name. La Guardia airport is the costliest to build at the time, $45 million.
 
October 25: The prototype Handey Page Halifax (serial no. L7244) makes its first flight from RAF Bicester with J.L.B.H. Cordes at the controls.
 
October 25: The prototype Handey Page Halifax (serial no. L7244) makes its first flight from RAF Bicester with J.L.B.H. Cordes at the controls.
 
November 24: British Overseas Airways Corporation is founded using the “Speedbird” callsign.
 
November 26: British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) is established through the amalgamation of Imperial Airways and British Airways.
 
December 23: Anthony Fokker dies in New York at the age of 49.
 
 
 

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