Abstract
THERE can be few applied sciences able to compare with aviation in the rate at which purely academic physical conceptions have been first translated into actual accomplishments and then industrialised, to the extent of the aircraft industry in the short space of a quarter of a century. Although the mechanics of flight have been investigated by certain mathematicians practically since the Middle Ages, continuous sustained flight for heavier-than-air machines, or even a useful degree of controlled flight in lighter-than-air craft, was not possible until some device capable of giving out power in the form of a propeller thrust was available, with reasonable weight. The internal combustion engine made this possible, and in 1903 the first power-driven flight in a heavier-than-air machine was made by one of the Wright brothers in the United States. The dirigible balloon antedated this achievement by a few years for lighter-than-air craft, although it is not possible to be precise about the date of the first flight owing to the difficulty of specifying exactly what constituted a power-driven flight, as distinct from having merely floated from one spot to another. It is certain, however, that at the commencement of the period under review, achievement in either school did not consist of much more than having succeeded in flying for a reasonable period of time, with a very small margin of safety. Little attention had been paid to progress towards any severely utilitarian aspects of the problem of flight.
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HILL, F. Developments in Aeronautical Science. Nature 135, 750–752 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/135750a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/135750a0