January 16 – Royal Air Force Major A. S. C. MacLaren and Captain Robert Halley arrive in Delhi, completing the first England-to-India flight. Their aircraft is a Handley Page V/1500.
January 19 – Jules Védrines claims a FF25,000 prize by landing an aircraft – a Caudron G-3 – on the roof of a department store in Paris. Making a hard landing in a space only 28 m × 12 m (92 ft × 39 ft), Védrines is injured and his aircraft is damaged beyond repair.
February 8 – Lucien Bossoutrot pilots a Farman F.60 Goliath carrying 12 passengers from Toussus-le-Noble, France, to RAF Kenley in England, on the first commercial flight between London and Paris to promote the Goliath and Henry Farman's plans for commercial aviation. To get around a prohibition on non-military flights still in place after the end of World War I, the Goliath's passengers all are former military pilots in uniform and carrying military orders directing them to take the flight, which takes 2 hours 30 minutes. The return flight the next day takes 2 hours 10 minutes.
February 25 – An Air Traffic Committee made up of representatives of 36 states in the British Empire under the Council of Defence meets for the first time.
March
An airmail service begins between Folkestone, England, and Cologne, Germany.
March 10 – Prime Minister of AustraliaBilly Hughes announces a £10,000 reward to the first aviator who will fly from the United Kingdom to Australia in less than 30 days.
A contingent of Women's Royal Air Force (WRAF) personnel arrive in France for overseas service, the first time that WRAF personnel have served outside the United Kingdom. Later in the year, another WRAF contingent will be sent to Germany.[3]
The U.S. Navy blimpC-5 completes a pioneering overnight flight from its base at Cape May, New Jersey, to St. John's in the Dominion of Newfoundland, becoming the first airship to visit St. John's. The U.S. Navy plans for C-5 to become the first airship to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, from St. John's to Europe. However, shortly after arriving at St. John's, C-5 breaks her mooring lines during high winds and drifts out unmanned into the Atlantic, where she crashes in the evening 85 miles from St. John's. Recovered by a British ship, C-5 never flies again.[6][7][8]
May 27 – Curtiss NC-4 flies from the Azores to Lisbon, completing the first transoceanic flight. On May 30–31 she is flown on to Plymouth in England.
June
June 1 – A permanent flight of aircraft is stationed in San Diego to serve as a forest fire patrol. The machines are World War I-surplus Curtiss JN-4s.
June 6 – Canada becomes the first country to legislate and implement rules governing the entire domain of aviation within its borders when the Government of Canada establishes the Air Board as Canada's civil aviation authority. The Air Board is responsible for devising a means of and administering Canadian air defence, controlling and conducting all non-military government flying operations, and providing rules and regulations for all flying within Canada, including licensing, issuing air regulations, and managing air traffic. The Air Board is organized into three sections: the Department of the Controller of Civil Aviation, which controls all civil aviation; the Directorate of Flying Operations, which controls non-military government flying operations of the Air Board; and the headquarters of the Canadian Air Force.
June 21 – The fourth annual Aerial Derby in Britain – the first one held since 1914, the competition having been suspended during World War I – takes place, sponsored for the last time by the Daily Mail. It is dubbed the "Victory Aerial Derby" to commemorate the Allied victory in World War I. Sixteen participants fly over the same 94-mile (151-kilometer) circuit that was used in the 1914 competition, beginning and ending at Hendon Aerodrome in London with control points at Kempton Park, Esher, Purley, and Purfleet; for the first time, however, the aircraft fly the circuit twice because of the increase in the speed of airplanes since 1914. G. Gathergood is the overall winner, completing the race in 1 hour 27 minutes 42 seconds in an Airco DH.4R with no handicap; H. A. Hammersley wins the handicap competition in an Avro Baby with a time of 2 hours 41 minutes 23 seconds and a handicap of 1 hour 25 minutes 0 seconds.
June 25 – The world's first all-metal commercial airplane, the Junkers F.13, flies for the first time.[17]
June 28 – The Treaty of Versailles is signed. Among its many provisions is one which prohibits Germany from ever again possessing armed aircraft.
July
After resuming flying lessons (which he had discontinued in June 1914) during the first half of 1919, Winston Churchill, the United Kingdom's first Secretary of State for Air, suffers only severe bruises in the crash of an airplane which he is piloting during a lesson; his instructor, however, is hospitalised for several months with severe injuries and undergoes numerous reconstructive surgeries. Churchill never again takes flying lessons.[18]
July 2 – The U.S. Navy blimp C-8 explodes while landing at the U.S. Army post at Camp Holabird, Maryland, injuring approximately 80 adults and children who were watching it and shattering windows in homes a mile (1.6 km) away.[21][22]
July 2–6 – The British airshipR34 begins the first lighter-than-air crossing of the Atlantic Ocean and the first east-to-west Atlantic flight, leaving East Fortune, Scotland, and arriving in Mineola, New York, on July 6. Major E. M. Pritchard parachutes from R34 at Mineola, becoming the first person to arrive in the United States by air from Europe.[23]
July 10 – World War I fighter aceMorane-Saulnier and chief test pilotJean Navarre fly a Morane-Saulnier AI repeatedly between two telephone poles and under a wire between them to practice for an unauthorized first-ever flight under the arches of the Arc de Triomphe. This they hope will be a protest against pilots having to parade on foot at the upcoming July 14 Bastille DayWorld War I victory parade on the Champs-Elysées in Paris. During this practise the two pilots die in a crash.[24]
July 10–13 – R34 makes a 75-hour return flight from the United States to RNAS Pulham in Norfolk, England, to complete the first two-way crossing of the Atlantic by air.[23]
July 14 – Piloting a Fiat BR, the Italian Army's top test pilot, Lieutenant Francesco Breck-Papa, makes the first nonstop flight from Rome to Paris. The 1,200-kilometer (745-mile) flight also is the first nonstop flight between two European capitals. He later flies from Paris to London and then on to Amsterdam.[25]
July 18 – French pilot Raymonde de Laroche, the first woman to receive a license, dies along with her co-pilot in the crash of an experimental Caudron airplane at Le Crotoy airfield in France.[11]
Flying at an altitude of 1,200 feet (370 meters) over the Chicago Loop, the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company dirigible Wingfoot Air Express catches fire. It crashes into the Illinois Trust and Savings Building, killing three of the five people on board and killing 10 and injuring 27 bank employees in the building. It is the worst dirigible disaster in United States history at the time.
July 22 – Angered by the insistence of Second Assistant United States Postmaster GeneralOtto Praeger that they fly their routes on time even in zero visibility conditions in order to maintain fixed schedules or be fired – a policy that has resulted in 15 crashes and two fatalities in the previous two weeks alone – U.S. Airmail Service pilots begin a spontaneous strike. After Preager and the United States Post Office Department receive much negative comment in the press, the strike ends in less than a week when the Post Office Department agrees that officials in Washington, D.C., would no longer insist on pilots flying in dangerous weather conditions.[26]
During a reconnaissance mission by three de Havilland DH.9As of the Royal Air Force's No. 47 Squadron over southern Russia, ground fire punches holes in the fuel tank of the DH.9A of CaptainWalter Anderson (pilot) and Lieutenant John Mitchell. Mitchell climbs onto the wing and plugs the holes with his fingers, When another DH.9A is forced down, Anderson and Mitchell land to pick up its crew, with Mitchell holding off Bolshevik cavalry with the Lewis gun in the rear cockpit before again climbing onto the wing to plug the fuel tank's hole with his fingers despite being burned by the aircraft's exhaust. They return safely to base with the rescued crew. Anderson and Mitchell receive the Distinguished Service Order and later the Distinguished Flying Cross for their actions.[28]
August
Polish border troops shoot down a giant German Zeppelin-Staaken R.VI bomber making a clandestine night diplomatic flight between Ukraine and Germany. It is the last of only three R.IV bombers lost to enemy action, and the only one shot down by enemy forces after World War I.[29]
To protest against pilots having had to parade on foot at the July 14 Bastille Day World War I victory parade on the Champs-Elysées in Paris, French pilot Charles Godefroy flies his Nieuport fighter under the arches of the Arc de Triomphe, the first time this has been accomplished. Although the stunt is unauthorized, French authorities let him off with a warning.[35]
August 19 – The United States readopts its pre-January 1918 official national insignia for U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, and U.S. Marine Corps aircraft, a white star centered in a blue circle with a red disc centered within the star . The marking will remain in use until June 1, 1942.[39]
August 23 – With the Polish head of state, Marshal Józef Piłsudski, looking on, the first aircraft built in a free Poland – a CWL Słowik, a copy of the German Hannover CL.II – crashes during a public ceremonial flight due to faulty bracing wires, killing its two crewmen. The aircraft's constructor, Karol Słowik, is one of the dead.[40]
September 1 Edmonton Police Department used an aircraft to chase down a murder suspect wanted for murder of a police officer in Edmonton. Former WWI war ace Wop May piloted the craft. An early, if not the earliest, instance of an aircraft used in this way. (Police in Atlantic City, Wyoming, may have used aircraft in a chase a couple months earlier.)[42][43]
Aircraft of the Royal Air Force's No. 47 Squadron bomb and machine-gun a Bolshevik fleet of 40 boats assembled at Dubrovka on the Volga River for a bombardment of Tsaritsyn. By the third day of their constant attacks, 11 of the boats have been sunk and the rest flee up the river. Lieutenant Howard Mercer, an observer in one of the aircraft, receives the Distinguished Flying Cross for his actions during the attacks.[28][44]
September 24 – The 1919 Schneider Trophy race – the first since 1914 – is flown at Bournemouth in the United Kingdom. An Italian Savoia S.13 is the only finisher, but is disqualified for missing a turning buoy. When judges ask pilot Guido Janello to complete another lap, he runs out of fuel.
Commander Biard, flying the Supermarine route between Southampton and Le Havre, knocks his passenger out during the flight. The man, a Belgian banker named Lowenstein, wanted to open his umbrella to protect himself from the wind and rain.
October
October 4 – A new altitude world record of 9,622 meters (31,568 feet) is set by American pilot Rudolph Schroeder, flying a Packard-Le Peré LUSAC-11.
October 7 – The Dutch airline KLM is formed. From 2007 it will be the world's oldest airline still flying under its original name.
October 11 – Handley Page Transport begins offering the first in-flight meals, on its London-Brussels service. The meals, consisting of a sandwich, fruits and chocolate, are sold at 3 shillings each.
November 10 – The United States Army Air Service begins the first class at its new Air Service School of Application. The new school, located at McCook Field in Ohio, provides technical training in aeronautical engineering and is the predecessor of the Air Service's first service school, which will be founded in 1920.
November 12 – Brothers Keith and Ross Macpherson Smith set out on the first flight from England to Australia, flying Vickers Vimy G-EAOU. They will arrive in Darwin, Australia, on December 10 after flying 18,175 km (11,293 mi), winning a prize of £10,000 (£580,500 in 2024) from the Government of Australia.[16]
December 5 – Avianca is founded as the Sociedad Colombo-Alemana de Transporte Aéreo in Barranquilla, Colombia. From 2007 it will be the oldest operating airline in the Americas.
December 15 – The Swiss airline Ad Astra Aero S.A. is founded in Zürich, Switzerland.
December 16 – Construction of the Imperial Japanese Navyaircraft carrierHōshō begins. She is the second aircraft carrier in the world designed and built as such to be laid down, and will be the first to be completed.[49][50]
December 18 – Sir John Alcock is killed in a crash at Rouen, France.
December 31 – President of ColombiaMarco Fidel Suárez sanctions Colombia′s first law dealing with aviation. The law makes aviation companies and everything else in Colombia related to aviation subject to government regulations.
^Francillon, René J., Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1979, ISBN0-87021-313-X, p. 30.
^ abLayman, R.D., Before the Aircraft Carrier: The Development of Aviation Vessels 1849-1922, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1989, ISBN0-87021-210-9, p. 122.
^"Blimp Loosed By Gale; The Navy Dirigible C-5, Blown to Sea from Newfoundland and Picked Up by British Ship.\," The New York Times, May 16, 1919, pp. 1.
^"Our Runaway Airship Captured by British Ship Eighty-five Miles at Sea, East of St. John's, N.F.", The New York Times, May 16, 1919, pp. 1.
^Shock, James R., US Navy Airships, Edgewater, Florida: Atlantic Press, 2001, ISBN0-9639743-8-6, pp. 22-27.
^Omar, Mohamed (2001). The Scramble in the Horn of Africa. p. 402. This letter is sent by all the Dervishes, the Amir, and all the Dolbahanta to the Ruler of Berbera ... We are a Government, we have a Sultan, an Amir, and Chiefs, and subjects ... (reply) In his last letter the Mullah pretends to speak in the name of the Dervishes, their Amir (himself), and the Dolbahanta tribes. This letter shows his object is to establish himself as the Ruler of the Dolbahanta
^O'Connor, Derek, "The Hunt For the Mad Mullah," Aviation History, July 2012, pp. 44-45.
^ abcPawlak, Debra Ann, "The Baroness of Flight," Aviation History, July 2008, p. 17.
^Thetford, Owen, British Naval Aircraft Since 1912, Sixth Edition, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1991, ISBN1-55750-076-2, p. 121.
^Dobson, Christopher, and John Miller, The Day They Almost Bombed Moscow: The Allied War in Russia, 1918-1920, New York: Atheneum, 1986, no ISBN, pp. 222-223.
^Pawlak, Debra Ann, "The Baroness of Flight," Aviation History, July 2008, p. 17, claims the height reached was 15,748 feet (4,800 m).
^Tillman, Barrett, "Above and Beyond," Aviation History, January 1918, p. 30.
^ abcdMondey, David, ed., The Complete Illustrated History of the World's Aircraft, Secaucus, New Jersey: Chartwell Books, Inc., 1978, ISBN0-89009-771-2, p. 28.
^ abGuttman, Jon, "Heavy Metal Pioneer," Aviation History, January 2016, p. 7.
^Colvin, Perry, "Churchill's Aerial Adventures: The Future Prime Minister's Passion For Flying Helped Transform Military Aviation in Britain," Aviation History, January 2012, p. 19.
^Gooch, John, Mussolini and His Generals: The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy, 1922-1940, Cambridge, U.K: Cambridge University Press, 2007, ISBN978-0-521-85602-7, p. 53.
^ abMondey, David, ed., The Complete Illustrated History of the World's Aircraft, Secaucus, New Jersey: Chartwell Books, Inc., 1978, ISBN0-89009-771-2, p. 29.
^Hollway, Don, "The Sentinel of Verdun," Aviation History, November 2012, p. 40.
^Jensen, Richard, "The Suicide Club", Aviation History, May 2017, p. 52.
^Dobson, Christopher, and John Miller, The Day They Almost Bombed Moscow: The Allied War in Russia, 1918-1920, New York: Atheneum, 1986, no ISBN, p. 257.
^ abDobson, Christopher, and John Miller, The Day They Almost Bombed Moscow: The Allied War in Russia, 1918-1920, New York: Atheneum, 1986, no ISBN, p. 20.
^Guttman, Robert, "German Giant," Aviation History, September 2014, p. 15.
^Guttman, Jon, "Crazy Capronis," Aviation History, July 2008.
^Guttman, Jon, "Crazy Capronis," Aviation History, July 2008, p. 55.
^Dobson, Christopher, and John Miller, The Day They Almost Bombed Moscow: The Allied War in Russia, 1918-1920, New York: Atheneum, 1986, no ISBN, pp. 224, 225.
^Daniel, Clifton, Chronicle of the 20th Century, Mount Kisco, New York: Chronicle Publications, 1987, ISBN0-942191-01-3, p. 304.
^Dobson, Christopher, and John Miller, The Day They Almost Bombed Moscow: The Allied War in Russia, 1918-1920, New York: Atheneum, 1986, no ISBN, pp. 63-64.
^Swanborough, Gordon, and Peter M. Bowers, United States Navy Aircraft Since 1911, Second Edition, London: Putnam, 1976, ISBN0-370-10054-9, pp. 24, 27.
^Morgała, Andrzej. O samolocie inż. Słowika raz jeszcze in: "Lotnictwo z szachownicą" nr. 21(1/2007), pp.30-33 (in Polish)
^Mondey, David, ed., The Complete Illustrated History of the World's Aircraft, Secaucus, New Jersey: Chartwell Books, Inc., 1978, ISBN0-89009-771-2, p. 27.
^Dobson, Christopher, and John Miller, The Day They Almost Bombed Moscow: The Allied War in Russia, 1918-1920, New York: Atheneum, 1986, no ISBN, p. 21.
^Francillon, René J., Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1979, ISBN0-87021-313-X, p. 26.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, ISBN0-517-56588-9, p. 460.
^Peattie, Mark R., Sunburst: The Rise of Japanese Naval Air Power 1909-1941, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2001, ISBN1-55750-432-6, p. 17.
^Gardiner, Robert, ed., Conway(('))s All the World(('))s Fighting Ships 1906-1921, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1985, ISBN0-87021-907-3, p. 240.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 94.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 197.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, ISBN0-517-56588-9, p. 421.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, ISBN0-517-56588-9, p. 430.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 196.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 115.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN978-0-7607-0592-6, p. 77.
.svg){kind=small}