Full FAA Chronology at this link.
19280413: Hermann Koehl, a German, and James Fitzmaurice, an Irishman, accompanied by one passenger, made the first nonstop east-to-west crossing of the Atlantic by airplane, flying from Ireland to a crash landing on Greenly Island, Labrador, in the Junkers W-33L Bremen.
19900413: A Federal court declared FAA’s rules of practice in assessing civil penalties not exceeding $50,000 to be invalid because the agency had failed to give public notice of the proposed rules or to allow a period of public comment (see December 30, 1987). FAA accordingly suspended the program, issued a rulemaking proposal, and followed this with a final rule effective August 2, 1990. A law enacted August 15, 1990, provided new legislative authority for the program, extending it until August 1, 1992. The program became permanent with the Civil Penalty Assessment Act enacted on August 26, 1992.
20060413: Runway 11/29 opened at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport.
20110413: FAA announced that effective immediately, it had placed an additional air traffic controller on the midnight shift at 27 control towers around the country staffed with only one controller during that time. FAA took this action after an incident at Reno-Tahoe International Airport when a controller fell asleep while a medical flight carrying an ill patient attempted to land. The medical flight pilot communicated with the Northern California TRACON and landed safely. FAA suspended the controller, who was out of communication for approximately 16 minutes, while it investigated the incident. (See April 14, 2011.)
20200413: Attorney General William P. Barr issued guidance to Department of Justice components regarding counter-unmanned aircraft systems (C-UAS) actions authorized under the Preventing Emerging Threats Act of 2018. The guidance, a product of extensive collaboration between the Department of Justice, the Department of Transportation, and FAA, outlined the process by which authorized department components could request designation of facilities or assets for protection under the act. It ensured coordination with the FAA when any C-UAS action authorized under the act might affect aviation safety, civilian aviation and aerospace operations, aircraft airworthiness, and the use of the airspace. This included conducting a risk-based assessment in consultation with the Secretary of Transportation to examine potential airspace impacts and other considerations.