Scenario of Air Asia

INTRODUCTION TO
AVIATION INDUSTRY

Etymology

The term aviation, noun of action from stem of Latin avis "bird" with
suffix -ation meaning action or progress, was coined in 1863 by
French pioneer Guillaume Joseph Gabriel de La Landelle (1812–
1886) in "Aviation ou Navigation aérienne sans ballons".

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HISTORY

Aviation is the activities surrounding mechanical flights and the

aircrafts industry.  Aircraft  includes fixed wings  and  rotatory wing
types, morphable wings, wing less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-
than-air craft such as hot air balloons and airships. The flying
boats were in their turn replaced by land planes, and the new and
immensely powerful jet engine revolutionised both air travel
and military aviation.

Aviation began in the 18th century with the development of the hot

air balloons, an apparatus capable of atmospheric displacement
through buoyancy. Some of the most significant advancements in
aviation technology came with the controlled gliding flying of Otto
Lilienthal in 1896; then a large step in significance came with the
construction of the first powered airplane by the Wright brothers in
the early 1900s.

Since that time, aviation has been technologically revolutionized by

the introduction of the jet which permitted a major form of
transport throughout the world. The modern aeroplane with its
characteristic tail was established by 1909 and from then, the
history of the aeroplane became tied to the development of more
and more powerful engines.

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The first great ships of the air were the rigid balloons pioneered by
Ferdinand von Zeppelin, which soon became synonymous with
airships and dominated long-distance flight until the 1930s, when
large flying boats became popular.

Tower jumping

Daedalus working on Icarus wings.

Since antiquity, there have been stories of men strapping bird like
wings, stiffened cloaks or other devices to themselves and
attempting to fly, typically by jumping off a tower. The Greek legend
of Daedalus and Icarus is one of the earliest known; others
originated from ancient Asia and the European Middle Age. During
this early period, the issues of lift, stability and control were not
understood, and most attempts ended in serious injury or death.

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According to John Harding, Ibn Firnas' glider was the first attempt
at heavier-than-air flight in aviation history. In 11th century
Benedictine monk Eilmer of Malmesbury attached wings to his
hands and feet and flew a short distance, but broke both legs while
landing, also having neglected to make himself a tail. Many others
made well-documented jumps in the following centuries. As late as
1811,  Albrecht Berblinger constructed an  ornithopter  and
jumped into the Danube.

Kites
The  kite may
have been the first form of man-made
aircraft. It was invented in China possibly
as far back as the 5th century BC by Mozi 
(Mo Di) and Lu Ban (Gongshu Ban). Later
designs often emulated flying insects,
birds, and other beasts, both real and
mythical.

Some were fitted with strings and whistles to make musical sounds
while flying. Ancient and medieval Chinese sources describe kites
being used to measure distances, test the wind, lift men, signal,
and communicate and send messages.

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Kites spread from China around the world. After its introduction
into India, the kite further evolved into the fighter kite, where an
abrasive line is used to cut down other kites.

Man-carrying kites

Man-carrying kites are believed to have been used extensively in

ancient China, for both civil and military purposes and sometimes
enforced as a punishment. Stories of man-carrying kites also occur
in Japan, following the introduction of the kite from China around
the seventh century AD.

Rotor wing

The use of a rotor for vertical flight has existed since 400 BC in the
form of the bamboo-copter, an ancient Chinese toy. The similar
rotor on a nut appeared in Europe in the 14th century AD.

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Hot air balloons

From ancient times the Chinese have understood that hot air rises
and have applied the principle to a type of small hot air
balloon called a sky lantern.

A sky lantern consists of a paper balloon under or just inside which

a small lamp is placed. Sky lanterns are traditionally launched for
pleasure and during festivals. According to Joseph Needham, such
lanterns were known in China from the 3rd century BC.

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Renaissance

Eventually, after  Ibn Firnas's construction, some investigators

began to discover and define some of the basics of rational aircraft
design. Most notable of these was Leonardo da Vinci, although his
work remained unknown until 1797, and so had no influence on
developments over the next three hundred years. While his designs
are rational, they are not scientific, and particularly underestimate
the amount of power that would be needed.

Leonardo studied bird and bat flight, claiming the superiority of the

latter owing to its unperforated wing. He analysed these and
anticipating many principles of aerodynamics. He understood that
"An object offers as much resistance to the air as the air does to the
object.” Isaac Newton  would not publish his  third law of
motion until 1687.

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In 15th century, Leonardo wrote about and sketched many designs

for flying machines and mechanisms, including ornithopters, fixed-
wing gliders, rotorcraft, parachutes and a wind speed gauge. His
early designs were man-powered and included ornithopters and
rotorcraft; however he came to realise the impracticality of this and
later turned to controlled gliding flight, also sketching some designs
powered by a spring.

Lighter than air

In 1670, Francesco Lana de Terzi published a work that suggested

lighter than air flight would be possible by using copper foil spheres
that, containing a vacuum, would be lighter than the displaced air
to lift an airship. While theoretically sound, his design was not
feasible: the pressure of the surrounding air would crush the
spheres. The idea of using a vacuum to produce lift is now known
as vacuum airship but remains unfeasible with any
current materials.

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In 1709, Bartolomeu de Gusmao presented a petition to King John

V of Portugal, begging for support for his invention of an airship, in
which he expressed the greatest confidence. The public test of the
machine, which was set for 24 June 1709, did not take place.
According to contemporary reports, however, Gusmao appears to
have made several less ambitious experiments with this machine,
descending from eminences. It is certain that Gusmao was working
on this principle at the public exhibition he gave before the Court
on 8 August 1709, in the hall of the Casa da India in Lisbon, when
he propelled a ball to the roof by combustion.

Balloons

1783 was a watershed year for ballooning and aviation. Between 4 th

June and 1st December, five were achieved in France:
 On 4th June, the Montgolfier brothers demonstrated their
unmanned hot air balloon at Annonay, France.

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 On 27th August, Jacques Charles launched the world's first

unmanned hydrogen-filled balloon, from the Champ de
Mars, Paris.
 On 19th October, the Montgolfiers launched the first
manned flight, a tethered balloon with humans on board, at
the  Folie Titon  in Paris. The aviators were the
scientist Jean-Francois Pilatre de Rozier, the manufacture
manager  Jean-Baptiste Réveillon, and Giroud de Villette.
 On 21th November, the Montgolfiers launched the first free
flight with human passengers. King Louis XVI had originally
decreed that condemned criminals would be the first pilots,
but Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, along with the Marquis
François d'Arlandes, successfully petitioned for the honor.
They drifted 8 km (5.0 mi) in a balloon-powered by a wood
fire.
 On 1st December, Jacques Charles and the Nicolas-Louis
Robert  launched their manned hydrogen balloon from the
Jardin des Tuileries in Paris, as a crowd of 400,000
witnessed. They ascended to a height of about 1,800 feet
(550 m) and landed at sunset in Nesles-la-Vallee after a
flight of 2 hours and 5 minutes, covering 36 km. After
Robert alighted Charles decided to ascend alone. This time
he ascended rapidly to an altitude of about 9,800 feet
(3,000 m), where he saw the sun again, suffered extreme
pain in his ears, and never flew again.

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Airships

Airships were originally called "dirigible

balloons" and are still sometimes called
dirigibles today. Work on developing a steerable
balloon continued sporadically throughout the
19th century. The first powered, controlled,
sustained lighter-than-air flight is believed to
have taken place in 1852 when Henri
Giffard flew 15 miles (24 km) in France, with a
steam engine driven craft.

Another advance was made in 1884, when the first fully controllable
free-flight was made in a French Army electric-powered airship, La
France, by Charles Renard and Arthur Krebs. The 170-foot (52 m)
long, 66,000-cubic-foot (1,900 m3) airship covered 8 km (5.0 mi) in
23 minutes with the aid of an 8½ horsepower electric motor.

However, these aircraft were generally short-lived and extremely

frail. Routine, controlled flights would not occur until the advent of
the internal combustion engine.

The first aircraft to make routine controlled flights were non-rigid

airships (sometimes called "blimps".) The most successful early
pioneering pilot of this type of aircraft was the Brazilian Alberto
Santos-Dumont  who effectively combined a balloon with an

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internal combustion engine. On 19th October 1901, he flew his

airship Number 6 over Paris from the Parc de Saint Cloud around
the Eiffel Tower and back in under 30 minutes to win the Deutsch
de la Meurthe prize. Santos-Dumont went on to design and build
several aircraft.

At the same time that non-rigid airships were starting to have some
success, the first successful rigid airships were also being
developed. These would be far more capable than fixed-wing aircraft
in terms of pure cargo carrying capacity for decades.

17th and 18th centuries

Italian inventor  Tito Livio Burattini, invited by the  Polish  King

Władysław IV  to his court in  Warsaw, built a model aircraft with
four fixed glider wings in 1647. Described as "four pairs of wings
attached to an elaborate 'dragon', it was said to have successfully
lifted a cat in 1648 but not himself. He promised that "only the
most minor injuries" would result from landing the craft. His
"Dragon Volant" is considered "the most elaborate and sophisticated
aeroplane to be built before the 19th Century".

The first published paper on aviation was "Sketch of a Machine for

Flying in the Air" by Emanuel Swedenborg published in 1716. This
flying machine consisted of a light frame covered with strong canvas
and provided with two large oars or wings moving on a horizontal

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axis, arranged so that the upstroke met with no resistance while the
downstroke provided lifting power.

Swedenborg knew that the machine would not fly, but suggested it
as a start and was confident that the problem would be solved. He
wrote: "It seems easier to talk of such a machine than to put it into
actuality, for it requires greater force and less weight than exists in
a human body. The science of mechanics might perhaps suggest a
means, a strong spiral spring. If these advantages and requisites
are observed, perhaps in time to come someone might know how
better to utilize our sketch and cause some addition to be made so
as to accomplish that which we can only suggest. Yet there are
sufficient proofs and examples from nature that such flights can
take place without danger, although when the first trials are made
you may have to pay for the experience, and not mind an arm or
leg".

19th Century

Balloon jumping replaced tower jumping, also demonstrating with

typically fatal results that man-power and flapping wings were
useless in achieving flight. At the same time scientific study of
heavier-than-air flight began in earnest. In 1801, the French officer
André Guillaume Resnier de Gou e managed a 300-metre glide by
starting from the top of the city walls and broke only one leg on
arrival. 

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In 1837 French mathematician and brigadier general Isidore

Didion stated, "Aviation will be successful only if one finds an
engine whose ratio with the weight of the device to be supported will
be larger than current steam machines or the strength developed by
humans or most of the animals".

Drawing directly from Cayley's work, Henson's 1842 design for

an aerial steam carriage  broke new ground. Although only a
design, it was the first in history for a propeller-driven fixed-wing
aircraft. It achieved lift-off under its own power after launching from
a ramp, glided for a short time and returned safely to the ground,
making it the first successful powered glide in history.

Jean-Marie Le Bris and his flying machine, Albatros II, 1868

Alphonse Penaud, a Frenchman, advanced the theory of wing and

aerodynamics and constructed successful models of aeroplanes,
helicopters and ornithopters. In 1871, he flew the first
aerodynamically stable fixed-wing aeroplane, a model monoplane
he called the "Planophore", a distance of 40 m (130 ft).

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Penaud's model incorporated several of Cayley's discoveries,

including the use of a tail, wing dihedral for inherent stability, and
rubber power. The planophore also had longitudinal stability, being
trimmed such that the tailplane was set at a smaller angle of
incidence than the wings, an original and important contribution to
the theory of aeronautics. Pénaud's later project for an amphibian
aeroplane, although never built, incorporated other modern
features. A tailless monoplane with a single vertical fin and twin
tractor propellers, it also featured hinged rear elevator and rudder
surfaces, retractable undercarriage and a fully enclosed,
instrumented cockpit.

In 1884, Alexandre Goupil published his work La Locomotion

Aerienne  (Aerial Locomotion), although the flying machine he later
constructed failed to fly.

Maxim's flying machine

Sir Hiram Maxim was an American engineer who had moved to
England. He built his own whirling arm rig and wind tunnel and
constructed a large machine with a wingspan of 105 feet (32 m), a
length of 145 feet (44 m), fore and aft horizontal surfaces and a

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crew of three. Twin propellers were powered by two lightweight

compound steam engines each delivering 180 hp (130 kW).

The overall weight was 8,000 pounds (3,600 kg). It was intended as

a test ride to investigate aerodynamic lift: lacking flight controls it
ran on rails, with a second set of rails above the wheels to restrain
it. Completed in 1894, on its third run it broke from the rail,
became airborne for about 200 yards at two to three feet of
altitude and was badly damaged upon falling back to the ground. It
was subsequently repaired, but Maxim abandoned his experiments
shortly afterwards.

Langley

After a distinguished career in astronomy and shortly before

becoming Secretary of the  Smithsonian Institution, Samuel
Pierpont Langley started a serious investigation into aerodynamics
at what is today the  University of Pittsburgh.

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In 1891, he published Experiments in Aerodynamics detailing his

research, and then turned to building his designs. He hoped to
achieve automatic aerodynamic stability, so he gave little
consideration to in-flight control.  On 6th May 1896,
Langley's Aerodrome No.5 made the first successful sustained flight
of an unpiloted, engine-driven heavier-than-air craft of substantial
size. It was launched from a spring-actuated catapult mounted on
top of a houseboat on the Potomac River near Quantico, Virginia.
Two flights were made that afternoon, one of 1,005 metres (3,297 ft)
and a second of 700 metres (2,300 ft), at a speed of approximately
25 miles per hour (40 km/h). On both occasions, the Aerodrome
No.5 landed in the water as planned, because, in order to save
weight, it was not equipped with landing gear.

Whitehead

Gustave was a German who emigrated to

the U.S., where he soon changed his name
to Whitehead. From 1897 to 1915, he
designed and built early flying machines
and engines. On 14 August 1901, two and
a half years before the Wright Brothers'
flight, he claimed to have carried out a controlled, powered flight in
his  Number 21 monoplane  at  Fairfield, Connecticut.

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The flight was reported in the Bridgeport Sunday Herald local

newspaper. About 30 years later, several people questioned by a
researcher claimed to have seen that or other Whitehead flights.

Wright brothers

The Wrights appear to be the first to make serious studied attempts

to simultaneously solve the power and control problems. Both
problems proved difficult, but they never lost interest. They solved
the control problem by inventing  wing warping for roll control,
combined with simultaneous yaw control with a steerable rear
rudder.

Almost as an afterthought, they designed and built a low-powered

internal combustion engine. They also designed and carved wooden
propellers that were more efficient than any before, enabling them
to gain adequate performance from their low engine power.

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Although wing-warping as a means of lateral control was used only

briefly during the early history of aviation, the principle of
combining lateral control in combination with a rudder was a key
advance in aircraft control. While many aviation pioneers appeared
to leave safety largely to chance, the Wrights' design was greatly
influenced by the need to teach themselves to fly without
unreasonable risk to life and limb, by surviving crashes. This
emphasis, as well as low engine power, was the reason for low flying
speed and for taking off in a headwind. Performance, rather than
safety, was the reason for the rear-heavy design because
the canard could not be highly loaded; anhedral wings were less
affected by crosswinds and were consistent with the low yaw
stability.

The Wrights continued flying at Huffman Prairie near Dayton, Ohio

in 1904. In May 1904 they introduced the Flyer II, a heavier and
improved version of the original Flyer. On 23 rd June 1905, they first
flew a third machine, the Flyer III. After a severe crash on 14 July
1905, they rebuilt the Flyer III and made important design changes.
They almost doubled the size of the elevator and rudder and moved
them about twice the distance from the wings.
They added two fixed vertical vanes between the elevators and gave
the wings a very slight dihedral. They disconnected the rudder from
the wing-warping control, and as in all future aircraft, placed it on a
separate control handle. When flights resumed the results were
immediate. The serious pitch instability that hampered Flyers I and

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II was significantly reduced, so repeated minor crashes were

eliminated. Flights with the redesigned Flyer III started lasting over
10 minutes, then 20, then 30. Flyer III became the first practical
aircraft flying consistently under full control and bringing its pilot
back to the starting point safely and landing without damage.

Pioneers in Europe

Although full details of the Wright Brothers' system of flight control

had been published in L’Aerophile in January 1906, the importance
of this advance was not recognised, and European experimenters
generally concentrated on attempting to produce inherently stable
machines.

On 13th September 1906, a day after Ellehammer's tethered flight

and three years after the Wright Brothers' flight, the
Brazilian Alberto Santos-Dumont made a public flight in Paris with
the 14-bis, also known as Oiseau de proie  (French for "bird of
prey").

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This well-documented event was the first flight verified by the Aero-

Club de France of a powered heavier-than-air machine in Europe
and won the Deutsch-Archdeacon Prize for the first officially
observed flight greater than 25 m (82 ft). On 12th

November 1906, Santos-Dumont set the first world record

recognized by the Federation Aeronautique Internationale by flying
220 m (720 ft) in 21.5 seconds. Only one more brief flight was made
by the 14-bis in March 1907, after which it was abandoned.

In March 1907, Gabriel Voisin flew the first example of his Voisin

biplane. On 13th January 1908, a second example of the type was
flown by Henri Farman to win the Deutsch-Archdeacon Grand Prix
d'Aviation prize for a flight in which the aircraft flew a distance of
more than a kilometer and landed at the point where it had taken
off. The flight lasted 1 minute and 28 seconds.

Between the World Wars (1918 – 1939)

The years between  World War I and  World War II  saw great
advancements in aircraft technology. Airplanes evolved from low-
powered biplanes made from wood and fabric to sleek, high-
powered monoplanes made of aluminium, based primarily on the
founding work of Hugo Junkers during the World War I period and
its adoption by American designer William Bushnell Stout and
Soviet designer Andrei Tupolev.

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The first successful rotorcraft appeared in the form of the autogyro,

invented by Spanish engineer Juan de la Cierva and first flown in
1919. In this design, the rotor is not powered but is spun like a
windmill by its passage through the air. A separate powerplant is
used to propel the aircraft forwards.

After World War I, experienced fighter pilots were eager to show off
their skills. Many American pilots became barnstormers, flying into
small towns across the country and showing off their flying abilities,
as well as taking paying passengers for rides. Eventually, the
barnstormers grouped into more organized displays. Air shows
sprang up around the country, with air races, acrobatic stunts, and
feats of air superiority.

The air races drove engine and airframe development the Schneider

Trophy, for example, led to a series of ever faster and
sleeker monoplane designs culminating in the Supermarine S.6B.

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With pilots competing for cash prizes, there was an incentive to go

faster. Amelia Earhart was perhaps the most famous of those on
the barnstorming/air show circuit. She was also the first female
pilot to achieve records such as the crossing of the Atlantic and
Pacific Oceans.

Digital age - 21st Century

21st century aviation has seen increasing interest in fuel savings

and fuel diversification, as well as low cost airlines and facilities.
Additionally, much of the developing world that did not have good
access to air transport has been steadily adding aircraft and
facilities, though severe congestion remains a problem in many
upcoming nations. Around 20,000 city pairs are served by
commercial aviation, up from less than 10,000 as recently as 1996.

At the beginning of the 21st century, digital technology allowed

subsonic military aviation to begin eliminating the pilot in favor of
remotely operated or completely autonomous unmanned aerial
vehicles (UAVs). In April 2001 the unmanned aircraft Global
Hawk flew from Edwards AFB in the US to Australia non-stop and
unrefuelled. This is the longest point-to-point flight ever undertaken
by an unmanned aircraft and took 23 hours and 23 minutes. In
October 2003, the first totally autonomous flight across the Atlantic
by a computer-controlled model aircraft occurred. UAVs are now an

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established feature of modern warfare, carrying out pinpoint

attacks under the control of a remote operator.

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