The Record (Bergen County, NJ) December 17, 2003
Birds of prey
SOURCE: North Jersey Media Group
It's about 10:35 a.m., Orville Wright takes his place on the lower wing of his craft and, by moving a control lever with his right hand, releases a cable that holds the machine. His brother Wilbur steadies the craft, holding on to a wingtip, as it rolls slowly down the monorail launch track. The machine lifts off the rail after a 40-foot run, and flies. It flies for only 12 seconds and 120 feet, but it flies - taking off into the wind under its own power. After almost a decade of study, research, and development, and seven weeks after transporting, assembling, testing, and repairing the machine at their camp in a beach village on the Outer Banks of North Carolina near Kitty Hawk, the dawn of the airplane age has begun.
The craft, 605 pounds of muslin-covered spruce and ash, is powered by a 180-pound, 4-cylinder, 12.5-horsepower gasoline engine designed and built by the brothers, with the help of their bicycle shop employee Charles Taylor. The engine's driveshaft is connected to bicycle-type gears and chains that power two propellers, rotating an average of 348 rpm in opposite directions. The pilot rests his hips in a sliding cradle linked by wires to the flexible outer wings and the rear-mounted rudder. He maneuvers by shifting his hips right or left to raise or lower the wing tips on either side to guide and balance the plane. Additional control comes from a rudder in the back and a small hand lever that controls the forward elevator, which provides extra lift.
There are three more flights that day. Wilbur flies 175 feet in 12 seconds, then Orville covers 200 feet in 15 seconds, and finally Wilbur flies 852 feet in 59 seconds. Five residents witness all four flights. The brothers would have continued, but after the fourth flight a gust of wind flipped the plane and badly damaged it. It never flew again.
SOURCES: NASA; warbirdalley.com; theaerodrome.com; wfu.edu; blackbirds.net; globalaircraft.org; allstar.fiu.edu; www.army.mil; pbs.org; globalsecurity.org; www.airshipsonline.com; about.com; airdisaster.com; centennialofflight.gov; sprucegoose.org; lindberghfoundation.org; goremeballoons.com; flyingmachines.org; fiddlersgreen.net; "The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Book Of Flight"; American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Inc.; "100 Years of Flight," by Bill Sweetman.
RESEARCH BY DOROTHY FERSCH, LEN IANNACCONE, MADELEINE NASH, AND PAUL WILDER / STAFF LIBRARIANS
© Copyright 2003, Bergen Record Corporation
