This is a list of aviation-related events from 1934:
Events
Sir Alan Cobham's Flight Refuelling Ltd. develops the looped-hose aerial refueling system, a weighted cable let out of a tanker aircraft and grabbed by a grapnel fired from the receiving aircraft. It is the first practical aerial refueling system, and will not be replaced until the probe-and-drogue system is perfected in 1945.[1]
January 10–11 – A flight of six United States Navy Consolidated P2Yflying boats sets a new distance record for formation flying of 2,400 miles (3,900 km) between San Francisco, and Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii. They also set a new speed record for this crossing of 24 hours 35 minutes.
January 30 – Soviet aeronauts Pavel Fedosenko, Andrey Vasenko, and Ilya Usyskin take the hydrogen-filled high-altitude balloonOsoaviakhim-1 on its maiden flight to a record-setting altitude of 72,182 feet (22,001 meters), where it remains for twelve minutes. The 7-hour 14-minute flight – during which the balloon travels 470 kilometers (290 miles)( from its launch site – ends in tragedy when the crew loses control of the balloon during its descent and the gondola disintegrates and crashes near the village of Potizh-Ostrog in Insarsky District of Mordovian Autonomous Oblast in the Soviet Union, killing the crew.[5][6]
The first airmail flight between Australia and New Zealand is made by Charles Ulm in an Avro Ten, taking 14 hours 10 minutes.
Germany begins a regular air mail service between Africa and South America, employing Dornierflying boatscatapulted from depot ships. Dornier Do 26s will later fly the route without the assistance of ships, and various Dornier flying boats will complete over 300 crossings before the outbreak of World War II brings the service to an end in 1939.[7]
February 19 – The United States Army Air Corps begins flying U.S. airmail in the wake of President Roosevelt's cancellation of all U.S. Air Mail contracts.[8]
February 26 – In the first week of U.S. Army Air Corps delivery of U.S. Air Mail, five Army aviators have been killed in accidents. The death rate highlights the lack of training of most U.S. Army pilots in night and bad-weather flying.[8]
The Panagra Ford 5-AT-C Trimotor NC407H suffers engine failure and crashes on takeoff at Lima-Callao International Airport at Lima, Peru, killing three of the 15 people on board.[14]
April
Six Soviet and two American airmen rescue the crew of the Soviet commercial icebreakerChelyuskin from the ice of the Chukchi Sea, where the ship had sunk on February 13.[15]
April 11 - Renato Donati of Italy sets a new world altitude record of 14,433 m (47,352 ft) in a Caproni Ca 113.[16]
May
May 7 – U.S. Army Air Corps delivery of U.S. Air Mail comes to an end. During the 78 days of delivering air mail, 12 Army air crew have died in 66 accidents. The losses convince U.S. Army officials of the need to train their pilots in flying at night and in bad weather.[8]
May 8–23 – Jean Batten sets a new women's speed record between England and Australia. She flies a de Havilland DH.60 and makes the trip in 14 days 22 hours.
May 19 – The largest heavier-than-air aircraft built anywhere in the 1930s, the 63 meter wingspan, 42 tonne takeoff weight, Andrei Tupolev-designed ANT-20Maksim Gorki, makes its first flight in the Soviet Union.
May 28 – French Couzinet 71flying boats begin the first regular air mail service across the South Atlantic Ocean.[7]
June 12 – In the United States, the Air Mail Act of 1934 closely regulates the contracting of air mail services and prohibits aircraft manufacturers from owning airlines.[21]
July 26 – United States Army Air CorpsMajorWilliam E. Kepner, CaptainAlbert W. Stevens, and Captain Orvil A. Anderson make the "National Geographic Society–U.S. Army Air Corps Stratosphere Flight" in the balloon Explorer in an attempt to set a new world altitude record for human flight. Launching from a depression that becomes known as the "Stratobowl" in Moonlight Valley in the Black Hills near Rapid City, South Dakota, they reach about 60,000 feet (18,000 meters) – about 12,000 feet (3,700 meters) short of the record – before a tear in the balloon forces them to descend over central Nebraska. Eventually, half the gas bag tears away, and they decide to bail out as the balloon passes 4,000 feet (1,200 meters) in a dangerously rapid descent. All three men parachute to safety, the last of them exiting the gondola at an altitude of only about 500 feet (150 meters), before the gondola crashes.[6][24]
July 27 – During a flight from Zurich-Dübendorf Airport in Switzerland to Stuttgart Airport in Stuttgart, Germany, the SwissairCurtiss T-32 Condor IICH-170 encounters severe turbulence and loses a wing in flight at an altitude of 3,000 meters (9,800 feet). It crashes in a forest near Wurmlingen in Tuttlingen, Germany, and burns, killing all 12 people on board, including the first European female flight attendant Nelly Diener. It is the deadliest civil aviation accident of 1934.[25]
August
The first National Air Meet for Women takes place at Dayton, Ohio. During a 50-mile (80-km) individual race, aviation record-holder Frances Marsalis dies in a crash at age 29.[26]
August 8–9 – James Ayling and Len Reid make the first non-stop flight from Canada to England, in a de Havilland DH84, taking 30 hours 50 minutes for the flight.
September 5 – While undergoing inflation with hydrogen gas in Moscow's Kuntsevo District for a planned September 24 ascent to set a new human fight altitude record, the Soviet balloon USSR-2 is destroyed by a fire ignited by a stray spark. The accident prompts the Soviet Union's People's Commissar of Defense, Kliment Voroshilov, to suspend the Soviet Union's high-altitude manned balloon program.[28]
September 7–16 – As part of Challenge International de Tourisme 1934, a 9,537 km (5,926 mi) race takes place over Europe and North Africa, concluding with a maximum speed trial over a 297 km (185 mi) triangular course on September 16.
Shortly after takeoff from Heston Airport in Hounslow, England, the Handley Page W.10 airliner G-EBMM, operated by National Aviation Displays, suffers a structural failure and crashes at Aston Clinton, killing all four people on board.[29]
September 29 – A London, Scottish & Provincial Airways Airspeed Couriercrashes at Timberden Bottom, Shoreham, Kent, in the United Kingdom, killing all four people on board. Flying debris injures two people on the ground.
October
The Japan Aeroplane Company Ltd. is founded, with plants at Yokohama and Yamagata, Japan.[30]
The Government of the Philippines passes an act to regulate foreign aircraft operations in the Philippines and to require a franchise from the Philippine government in order to operate an air service in the Philippines.
October 19 – The Holyman's Airwaysde Havilland DH.86 Express airliner Miss Hobart (registration VH-URN) crashes in the Bass Strait during a domestic flight in Australia from Melbourne, Victoria, to Launceston, Tasmania, killing all 11 people on board. Miss Hobart had just flown the new airline's first flight three weeks earlier, and one of its founders, Captain Victor Holyman, is among the dead.[33]
October 20-November 3 - Sir Charles Kingsford Smith makes the first eastward crossing of the Pacific Ocean, from Brisbane, Australia to San Francisco, in the Lady Southern Cross. The Hawaii-to-San Francisco leg of his crossing on November 3 is the first eastward flight from Hawaii to North America.[31]
Husband and wife Jean and Jeannette Piccard ascend to an altitude of 57,579 feet (17,550 meters) over Lake Erie in the balloon A Century of Progress.[6] The first licensed female balloon pilot in the United States, Jeannette Piccard retains control of the balloon for the entire flight, and the flight makes her the first woman to fly in the stratosphere.
United Airlines Flight 6, a Boeing 247, loses power in both engines shortly after takeoff from Chicago. The three-man crew manages to crash-land the plane, and the entire crew and the lone passenger survive.
December 31 – Helen Richey becomes the first woman to pilot a regular civil flight, taking a Central AirlinesFord Trimotor on the Washington, D.C. to Detroit route; however, she gets few subsequent flights.[39]
^Crosby, Francis, The Complete Guide to Fighters & Bombers of the World: An Illustrated History of the World's Greatest Military Aircraft, From the Pioneering Days of Air Fighting in World War I Through the Jet Fighters and Stealth Bombers of the Present Day, London: Hermes House, 2006, ISBN9781846810008, p. 46.
^Peattie, Mark R., Sunburst: The Rise of Japanese Naval Air Power 1909–1941, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2001, ISBN1-55750-432-6, p. 44.
^Francillon, René J., Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1979, ISBN0-87021-313-X, p. 23.
^ abMondey, David, ed., The Complete Illustrated History of the World's Aircraft, Secaucus, New Jersey: Chartwell Books, Inc., 1978, ISBN0-89009-771-2, p. 34.
^ abcdBauman, Richard, "Link to the Future", Aviation History, May 2014, pp. 50-51.
^Layman, R.D., Before the Aircraft Carrier: The Development of Aviation Vessels 1849–1922, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1989, ISBN0-87021-210-9, p. 105.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 327.
^Bauman, Richard, "Link to the Future", Aviation History, May 2014, p. 52.
^Scheina, Robert L., Latin America: A Naval History 1810–1987, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1987, ISBN0-87021-295-8, p. 126.
^Pelletier, Alain (2012). "Window dressing only..: Helen Richey (1909–1947)". High-Flying Women: a World History of Female Pilots. Sparkford: Haynes. p. 117. ISBN978-0-85733-257-8.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN0-7607-0592-5, p. 59.
^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, pp. 152–153.
^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. 359.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 87.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 62.
^Francillon, René J., Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1979, ISBN0-87021-313-X, pp. 408, 410.
^Francillon, René J., Japanese Aircraft of the Pacific War, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1979, ISBN0-87021-313-X, p. 351.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN0-7607-0592-5, p. 48.
^Mikesh, Robert C.; Abe, Shorzoe (1990). Japanese Aircraft 1910-1941. London: Putnam. p. 134. ISBN978-0-851-77840-2.
^Polmar, Norman, "Historic Aircraft: Biplane Fighters in Action," Naval History, June 2011, p. 17.
^Donald, David, ed., The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1997, ISBN0-7607-0592-5, pp. 123–124.
^Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, p. 97.
