17 December 1903 – an aeroplane was born

An aeroplane was born.

On 17th December 1903, near Kill Devil Hills in the vicinity of Kitty Hawk in North Carolina, for the first time in history a powered aircraft heavier than air, successfully took off into the skies.

It was the Wilbur and Orville Wright’s brothers aeroplane, called Flyer I. It was Orville, who sat at the controls during the first, historic flight at the distance of 37 meters (120 feet) and that lasted 12 seconds. Later that day, the Wright brothers performed three more trials, improving the results consecutively by 53 meters (175 feet), 61 meters (200 feet) and finally, 260 meters (852 feet). The longest of flights, lasted 59 seconds. During the last landing the front elevator supports were damaged. The brothers planned to fix it, but unfortunately, soon the Flyer I sustained more, substantial damage, because of a heavy wind gust and was never flown again. However, Wright brothers didn’t give up and kept working on their further aircraft projects…

Photo: ´Seconds into the first airplane flight, near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; December 17, 1903´, for the first time published in 1908, via Wikipedia (Public Domain)