Author: ENDaviationinequity

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19300116: Frank Whittle, a British Royal Air Force officer and engineer, received a patent for his design of a turbojet aircraft engine. Manufacture of an experimental version of the engine began in 1936. On May 15, 1941, the Gloster E28/39, a British turbojet powered by a Whittle W/X jet engine, made its first official flight, at Cranwell, England. However, this first Allied jet flight came nearly two years after Germany had accomplished the feat. On August 27, 1939, the first air-breathing jet flight of an aircraft had occurred, accomplished by a German Heinkel He 178 aircraft with a jet engine by designed by Hans von Ohain.
19480116: The Airport Operators Council was established as an association of operators of U.S. commercial airports. In 1967, the association added the word “International” to its name to reflect a broadened membership.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19280115: The Aeronautics Branch published a list of newly licensed pilots that included James Herman Banning as holder of a limited commercial license. Banning was the first known African American to receive a Federal pilot license. The first Federal transport pilot license issued to an African American is believed to have been received by C. Alfred “Chief” Anderson in 1932.
Black aviators had been active in the United States as early as the years preceding World War I, an era when nearly all pilots were unlicensed. The first African American to receive a pilot certificate of any type was probably Eugene Bullard, who was licensed by the French air corps in 1917 and served as a combat pilot. In 1921, Bessie Coleman became the first African American to receive a pilot’s certificate from the Federation Aeronautique Internationale, an international organization based in Paris.
19400115: The first issue of the official Civil Aeronautics Journal appeared, superseding Air Commerce Bulletin (see July 1, 1929).

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19290114: The Commerce Department’s Aeronautics Branch received the Aero Club of America Trophy for 1928 for its outstanding development of airways and air navigation facilities. Robert J. Collier had established the award, first presented in 1912, to honor the previous year’s most outstanding contribution to U.S. aeronautics or astronautics. In 1922, the Aero Club of America was incorporated as the National Aeronautic Association (NAA), which assumed administration of the award and renamed it the Robert J. Collier Trophy in 1944.
19550114: The VORTAC Committee of the Air Navigation Development Board (ANDB) reported its inability to reach a unanimous decision to resolve the TACAN/VOR-DME controversy (see January 1954). Despite the split report of its committee, the ANDB favored development of TACAN.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19610113: An FAA directive gave the Bureau of Research and Development full responsibility for the improvement and modification of air navigation aids, communications, and related equipment used in the Federal airways system. While continuing to procure, install, and maintain such facilities, the Bureau of Facilities and Materiel, which had previously shared or performed certain R&D functions, would henceforth provide only required “immediate” engineering support.
19700113: Blanche Stuart Scott, often considered the first American woman to pilot an airplane, died. In September 1910, Scott made her first solo flight in a Curtiss Pusher at Hammondsport, N.Y.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19350112: Amelia Earhart took off in a Lockheed Vega from Honolulu and landed in Oakland, Calif., 18 hours 15 minutes later–making the first solo flight from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland.
19370112: Franklin Roosevelt submitted to Congress the Report of the President’s Committee on Administrative Management, popularly known as the Brownlow Report, named after chairman Louis Brownlow, a public administration expert. The committee had examined the proliferation of Federal boards, commissions, and agencies that operated independently of the President’s executive powers, and constituted a “fourth branch of Government.” The committee had no quarrel with the Congress’s intent in creating these agencies–they were needed to perform quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial functions.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19430111: Franklin D. Roosevelt became the first U.S. President to fly while holding office when he took off from Miami, Fla., aboard Pan American’s Dixie Clipper. On January 14, Roosevelt arrived in French Morocco to attend the Casablanca Conference. (See July 2, 1932.)
19450111: Administrator Theodore P. Wright of the Civil Aeronautics Administration announced the formation of an Advisory Committee on Non-Scheduled Flying, composed of representatives from the aviation industry and the private flyer sector, to assist CAA in planning for increased postwar private flying.
19490111: The Civil Aeronautics Board granted a certificate of convenience and necessity as a local service carrier to All American Airways, which had been founded in 1937 as All American Aviation.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19540110: A British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) de Havilland Comet I jetliner fell into the Mediterranean Sea with the loss of all 35 on board. BOAC temporarily suspended Comet operations after the accident, but resumed them on March 23. On April 8, a second Comet I crashed into the Mediterranean, killing all 21 occupants. Comet services were discontinued again when the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation withdrew the jet transport’s airworthiness certificate. On February 11, 1955, a Court of Inquiry into the two accidents announced that testing had revealed that the aircraft’s fuselage shell was prematurely vulnerable to metal fatigue. De Havilland engineers subsequently corrected the deficiencies, but the setback helped American manufacturers to overtake the British in the commercial jetliner race. (See May 2, 1952, and December 20, 1957.)
19660110: Reliance on radar for controlling air traffic advanced when a rule effective this date permitted pilots flying Instrument Flight Rules in a radar environment to omit routine position reports.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19430109: The Lockheed C-69 first flew. After the war, this four-engine, military transport was converted into a successful commercial airliner, the L-049 Constellation. In December 1945, CAA type-certificated the Constellation, which entered commercial passenger service on January 14, 1946, with Pan American. Model L-649, the first version manufactured entirely for civil use, carried 60 passengers and had a range of over 3,000 miles with 8 tons of payload. On November 26, 1968, a Western Air Lines “Connie” completed the type’s last scheduled airline flight in North America.
19470109: Regulations governing the administration of the Federal Airport Act received final approval, and two days later CAA announced the 1947 construction program, listing 800 airports for either construction or improvement.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19600108: The New York Times reported that Pan American World Airways had put into operation near Shannon, Ireland, the first unit in a planned worldwide radio transmission system using the “forward scatter” technique. This was the first such very-high-frequency ground station to be put into operation by an airline.
19620108: FAA established an Agency Regulatory Council to facilitate rulemaking and to insure the implementation of the Administrator’s rulemaking policies. The agency also established the position of Executive Director to provide full-time management for the Council.

Full FAA Chronology at this link.

19520107: CAA inaugurated radar departure control procedures at the Washington air route traffic control center. Use of radar for approach began July 1, 1952.
19590107: The Federal Aviation Agency began an extensive air traffic survey covering all segments of U.S. aviation–air carrier, military, and general aviation. Goals of the survey were to develop estimates of air activity through 1980 and to formulate a scientific method of forecasting air activity. FAA’s sampling of a period having the lowest level of air activity was followed in July and August by a second survey providing data on the summer peak.
19690107: FAA imposed additional airworthiness standards for small airplanes used in air taxi operations under Special Federal Aviation Regulation 23, effective this date. The standards applied to piston-powered and turboprop airplanes weighing 12,500 pounds or less and capable of carrying more than 10 occupants, including the flightcrew. (See September 7, 1964, and December 1, 1978.)