By: Mauran Thevarajah

Airplanes have been around for a little over 100

years. The first successful manned flight was
by the Wright Brothers in 1903 in a plane
called the “Wright Flyer.” It was in the air
for a little less than 70m, which is less than
the length of a Boeing 747.
As the years went by, airplanes have improved so
they travel higher, faster and made sure they
stay in the air for long enough periods. In
WWI guns were mounted on the aircraft,
which started air combats. These planes were
propelled by the spinning of the blade in front
of the plane. In 1939 Germany made the first
jet aircraft which was capable of very high
speeds back then. Eight years later the Bell
X-1 jet was the first to fly at supersonic
speeds, which means it went faster than the
speed of sound. The jet technology is very
crucial for people and countries all over the
world. This made transportation from one
place to the next very fast and made wars a
whole lot more dangerous. Some famous
aircraft manufacturers are Boeing, Airbus,
McDonald Douglas, and Lockheed Martin.
• In 1910 the first regular air passenger service took a
group of people between two cities in the U.S. The
flights used to take a long time so not many people
would fly, and it was also quite pricy for a flight. Air
travel wasn’t booming until 1952 when the DH 106
Comet was in service. The Comet was the first jet
powered airliner. The Comet cut long distance flights by
half, which got more people interested in air travel.
Unfortunately the Comet was grounded because it kept
crashing, but new models were made that used the same
concept with reduced crashing.
• In 1969 a big accomplishment in airliner history was the
Boeing 747 and the Concord. The 747 was called a
“Jumbo Jet” because the plane was bigger than any
other airliner in service. The 747 had a passenger
capacity of 416 people and could travel for very long
distances. The concord can only hold up to 128
passengers, so it wasn’t meant for capacity but speed.
The Concord reaches a cruising speed of mach 2 or 2,
333 km/h. The Concords trips usually go from London to
New Your and back. That trip which usually takes 6
hours took less than 4 hours. At this point air
transportation was used frequently and took people to
places around the world that they have never seen
before.
• In late 2006 the hype in airliners, which is the Airbus
A380, will be out in the market and ready for service.
This new airliner was made to please the passengers.
First of all it can hold 555 people, and it has 49% more
floor space and 35% more seating than the 747.The
Airbus is the new age in commercial air travel.
• Planes with weapons have been proven to be very useful
in wars. At the beginning of the first world war planes
were used for recon work, but later on machine guns
were mounted on the planes. When the first few planes
tried to shoot an enemy plane they used to shoot the
propeller which caused them to crash. The Germans
made an incredible fighter plane, the Fokker. The
machine guns on it were synchronized with the spin of
the propeller so the bullets don’t hit it.
• WWII planes did a lot more damage to their enemies
because now they carried bombs. If planes didn’t exist
the Hitler’s blitzkrieg tactic wouldn’t have worked too
well, which could have changed some of his victories
over countries.
• Military planes started to carry more and more bombs,
and had missiles to fight off other jets. Now there are
jets that are made to be invisible, or undetected under
radar. A fighter jet that “stealth” is the F117 Stealth
fighter. The shape of the plane deflects radar waves
away from the source, so then it sneaks up to the
target and drops a bomb which is accurately guided by
a laser. One of the best fighter jets of this age is the
Lockheed Martin F-22. The F-22 is very sleek and can
get through radar easily, very maneuverable, fast,
carries a huge load for a small fighter, and all weapons
are hidden to give a non- threatening look for it’s
enemies. Now planes are major ways for countries to
win wars, because they can do massive damage, and now
more and more carry nuclear weapons, which gives
countries a lot of power.
• In the future most of or all of the jets will
have a vectored thrust engine. This engine can
direct the exhaust into many different
directions, which give it more maneuverability.
Some cool things that can be done with this
engine is that your plane might be pointing
down but you go horizontally and lose no
altitude because of vectored thrust.
• Some projects that they are working for
fighter planes are improving the attacking
system. They are trying to develop a helmet
that is connected to the plane, and the
helmets have “gunsights”. This means that the
pilot can direct a missile or laser by looking at
the target and giving the voice command to
shoot.
• In the near future jets used in wars won’t
have pilots in the cockpit because it is too
dangerous. Instead the pilots will be
controlling the aircraft on a computer in a
safe building. These jets are called UCAV,
which stands for Unmanned Combat Air
Vehicle. This will allow jets to do outstanding
acrobatical moves in the air that couldn’t be
done with a pilot inside the jet.