100 Years Of Flight

[Furtherman]

Reading this article, I never realised that Wright brothers really did change the world, and mankind on December 17th, 1903.

It is amazing that is was possible for a person to witness that first flight and then 66 years later watch Neil Armstrong step onto the moon. We've landed on the moon!

But with all great acheviements, there are downsides.

I wonder what the world would have been like without the airplane. So much was accomplished without it, but just look at our world today with it. For one thing, there would be no airline commericals.

Wright brothers unleashed world-altering force (http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/7405918.htm)

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...with thanks to JustJon

[TheMojoPin]

Based on the fact it's the 21st century and I don't have a jetpack, I will salute the Wright Brothers with NOTHING.

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[high fly]

And just where the fuck is my briefcase that turns into a helicopter?
Huh?

" and they ask me why I drink"

[Bill From Yorktown]

and my video phone, or 2 way wrist communicator - no wait we have those.

I stink.

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[dingo]

Dam overacheaving bicycle mechanics asses like them are the reason people expect me to be productive at work. What did the Wright brothers do at the bike shop today They invented flight, what did the Johnson brothers do together when they worked together at a bike shop They suntanned and out back and surfed the net for porn. Now that I work at hte shop alone I post on a message board and read comics. and let me guess Unlike me they didn't have a collage degree? am i right about that one?

NJ's Sexiest Bicycle Mechanic

[high fly]

I say we're closer to having Flintstones-type technology than Jetsons-type technology...

" and they ask me why I drink"

[A.J.]

For one thing, there would be no airline commericals.

Or comics who make jokes about airline food.

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A Skidmark production.

Red Sox Nation

[high fly]

Unlike me, they didn't have a collage degree...

(snicker)

No, they had a degree in paper mache...

" and they ask me why I drink"

[PilotJeff]

I'd be out of a job. I agree that technology has taken a step back (ie the removal of the Concorde and supersonic travel), but just look at the amount of people who move next to an airport, then complain because of noise. Then these people get the media behind them and cause it to shut down (it's happened in some cases), set up curfews for airliners, and in most cases create sometimes dangerous noise abatement procedures. For those of you who don't know, most of us don't feel comfortable launching into bad weather with a full load and heavy on fuel only to chop the throttle to less than comfortable amounts so that people underneath us do not get bothered by the noise.

Pilots make the best approaches...

[curtoid]

I'm still waiting for my GET SMART-like shoe phone.

[KOP]

[Bill From Yorktown]

Today's the day the world became a little smaller, and a little more complicated.


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[KillOReilly]

Based on the fact it's the 21st century and I don't have a jetpack, I will salute the Wright Brothers with NOTHING.



And just where the fuck is my briefcase that turns into a helicopter?


Those lazy pricks, they stopped at Controlled Manned Powered (The Controlled flight wasn't really until they went to Dayton, OH to refine thier airplane design)

They could have kept working and invented the Jet Pack for us...

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[sr71blackbird]

The 20th century will no doubt go down as the most productive century since the
beginning of recorded history. And we witnessed it! I remember being 4 years old
watching the lunar landing. So many things happened that its really mind blowing.
When you think about us and what we can achieve and all the good we have done
(despite the bad) we really have a lot to be thankful for.

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[wilee]

Thank God for airplanes, as it means you have to spend less time in the car with the family if you're going on vacation somewhere distant.

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[PilotJeff]

For all those Wright Bros haters, here is some more info most people don't know:
The Wright brothers actually stopped the progress of aviation by patenting their so called "airplane" (It wasn't much more than a glider, anyway). Even after patenting the Wright Flier, they stopped working on it and returned to their bicycle shop. Why would they do this? Why not allow others to build on their ideas? Oh yea, and they f*cked their sister. Some heroes, huh?

Pilots make the best approaches...

[Zipgun]

I was watching the live footege earlier of their re-creation of the first flight.

Years of preparation...

Countless hours of hard work...

And the asshat pilot dips the wing and goes in the mud before he can even get off the runway track.

Nice going Smedley.


I'm sure Orville probably didn't get it on the first shot either, but at least they didn't have a live camera on them.



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[Jack_Doff]

If two wrongs don't make a right, what do two rights make?

An Airplane. Wow that cracked me up as a kid.

[NewYorkDragons80]

Fools, the Wright Brothers' real first flight was 3.5 seconds and 105 feet on December 13th! 81 years later to the day, this nigga was bizorn.

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[Mike Teacher]

KILL DEVIL HILLS, N.C. - No one knows who first harnessed the awesome power of fire. No date is recorded for the first spin of a wheel. But here where the turbulent Atlantic meets the dunes of North Carolina's Outer Banks, on a blustery Dec. 17, 1903, man first conquered the air.


OK I live for this stuff, admitted flight-space nerd, but even I must admit that while the Wright Brothers work did revolutionize flight; it was a point on a continuum. The above paragraph, while quite nice in its imagery, is simply incorrect. People were flying, crudely, before them; their success was in the wrestling real control of a powered flying thingy. Amazing yes, but I think some others, like:

Lindbergh's Solo Crossing of Atlantic

Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier

Apollo 8's first manned mission to the moon

Apollo 11-17

Pioneer and Voyager craft exploring the solar system and now zooming out to the stars

Stand out as just as significant, if not more. Anyway, way to go Orville and Wilbur!

From this months Scientific American Below [EDIT-ed as the Mods would like [and it's a good idea, because God DAMN some of you ramble on in your posts!!!!!!!]


The Equivocal Success of the Wright Brothers
By Daniel C. Schlenoff


In December 17, 1903, Orville Wright took off in a powered airplane, flew for 12 seconds and 120 feet, then bumped down into the sand. A century later we honor the date as an aviation milestone, but for that flight alone it is hard to argue that the Wrights were more successful than other inventors who had already flown farther (and crashed harder).

It took two more years for the Wrights to build and fly the world's first truly controllable airplane. Unfortunately, until they felt sure of the sale of their perfected machine, their secretiveness invited skepticism from Scientific American and other publications of the day and left them underappreciated by their peers and the general public.
Other contenders for the "first airplane" laurels merely made short or uncontrolled flights. Clement Ader can be credited with the first powered takeoff in 1890. But his steam-powered aircraft reached an altitude of eight inches, sufficient to classify it as a flight only to his French countrymen. German-born Gustave Whitehead was adept at fabricating stories about flying in the U.S., but he never built a workable airplane. New Zealanders are proud of Richard Pearse: in March 1903 this reclusive, eccentric farmer flew his bamboo-and-canvas monoplane for about 450 feet before crashing into a gorse hedge. His example illustrates, rather painfully, the need for controllability in aerial navigation.


Me Moi (http://www.miketheteacher.com)

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[high fly]

Every time I see the Wright brother's plane, I keep wondering: "Where do you hook the bombs on?"

" and they ask me why I drink"

[TheMojoPin]

It took two more years for the Wrights to build and fly the world's first truly controllable airplane.

It did? Well, then FUCK THEM.

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[sr71blackbird]

Actually, in the course of their day, they had one flight that went 120 feet, I think the first actual lift off was maybe 10 to 15 feet. But man was flying long before that, Chinese where floating around in balloons for probably 100 years before that. There were crude zeppelins in Europe, notably in France from around 1790's or so. This was a milestone because it was controlled flight, not just dependant on winds and temperature. Their plane had controls for yaw, pitch, roll, speed and whatnot.

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[Teenweek]

If two wrongs don't make a right, what do two rights make?

An Airplane. Wow that cracked me up as a kid.



I know 3 rights make a left. 2 rights make a U-Turn

[Bill From Yorktown]

Actually, in the course of their day, they had one flight that went 120 feet, I think the first actual lift off was maybe 10 to 15 feet. But man was flying long before that, Chinese where floating around in balloons for probably 100 years before that. There were crude zeppelins in Europe, notably in France from around 1790's or so. This was a milestone because it was controlled flight, not just dependant on winds and temperature. Their plane had controls for yaw, pitch, roll, speed and whatnot.



clarification - it was the first controlled powered flight.

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This message was edited by Bill From Yorktown on 12-18-03 @ 10:01 AM

[sr71blackbird]

Just think of how far we've come. Probably the first fly swatters weren't much more than some sort of striking surface attached to the end of a stick-like handle.

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[ADF]

And boy are our arms tired!

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[FUNKMAN]

without the airplane the soldiers would have had to sneak the atom bombs into Japan 'during the night' on dollies and toss them off somebodies roof...


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This message was edited by FUNKMAN on 12-18-03 @ 1:05 PM

[high fly]

Without the airplane, the Japanese would have had to swing over Pearl Harbor on ropes, Tarzan-style, in order to drop bombs on our ships...

" and they ask me why I drink"