27 March 1907 (France): Romanian Trajan Vuia begins tests of his airplane, newly fitted with steering surfaces. He makes a short flight of 33 feet in Paris, France.

27 March 1918 (France): Attacked by German planes, bomber pilot Alan McLeod is strafed from below: Three bullets strike him and others puncture his fuel tank, setting his plane on fire. Lt McLeod climbs onto the lower left wing and steers the plane to a crash landing between the front lines. He pulls his gunner out of the wreck into a fox hole, from which they are rescued.

27 March 1918 (UK): Lt. Alan A. McLeod was awarded the Victoria Cross for action this day flying a reconnaissance aircraft with 2 Squadron RFC.

27 March 1924 (Hawaii Territory): British-born 2nd Lt. Oscar Monthan (1885-1924) is killed when his Martin NBS-1 (AS-68448) bomber of the 5th Composite Group, fails to clear baseball field backstop on take-off from Luke Field, Ford Island, Oahu, Hawaiian Islands. Davis-Monthan Landing Field, later Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Tucson, Arizona, is named in part for him, 1 November 1925. He attended high school in that community.

27 March 1927 (USA): Young American airmail pilot Charles A. Lindbergh, registers his entry in the Raymond Orteig challenge for the first man to cross the Atlantic Ocean solo. The challenge and a $25,000 prize, has been issued in 1920, but no one has so far been successful in making the flight.

27 March 1931 (USA): The crash of a TWA Fokker F.10 at Bazaar, Kansas prompts the first grounding of an aircraft type. The grounding was ordered by the US Department of Commerce.

27 March 1934 (Argentina): First flight of the FMA AeC.3. The FMA AeC.3 was a light utility aircraft built in Argentina in 1934. It was a further development in the series of designs that had originated with the AeC.1 three years previously. Like its immediate predecessor, the AeC.2, the AeC.3 was an open-cockpit variant of the family, and was distinguished mainly in its use of an Armstrong Siddeley Genet Major engine.

27 March 1936 (Netherlands): First flight of the Fokker D.XXI fighter, a low-wing monoplane with a steel tube fuselage covered in large part by fabric, designed for use by the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army Air Force.

27 March 1943 (Firth of Clyde): The British escort aircraft carrier HMS Dasher suffers a massive accidental internal explosion and sinks off the Isle of Arran in the Firth of Clyde, killing 379. There are 149 survivors.

27 March 1944 (Norwegian Sea): The Arctic convoy JW 58 departs Loch Ewe, Scotland, bound for the Kola Inlet in the Soviet Union. The British aircraft carriers HMS Activity and HMS Tracker escort JW 58 and the return convoy RA 58, which reaches Loch Ewe on April 14. During their cruise, their aircraft sink or contribute to sinking two German submarines, attack three more, and shoot down six German aircraft without the loss of a merchant ship.

27 March 1945 (Straits of Shimonoseki): In support of the upcoming U.S. invasion of Okinawa, 105 Twentieth Air Force Boeing B-29 Superfortress bombers strike airfields and an aircraft factory on Kyushu and lay naval mines in Shimonoseki Strait.

27 March 1945 (North Atlantic): RAF Consolidated LB-30 Liberator II (AL504), first Mk. II accepted by the British, converted to VIP transport for the Prime Minister, named “Commando.” Lost over the Atlantic Ocean between the Azores and Ottawa, Canada. The Prime Minister was not on board.

27 March 1945 (UK): The final V-2 missile to hit England falls in Kent.

27 March 1946 (France/US): An air agreement is signed by France and the US giving Air France the right to serve the cities of Boston, New York, Washington D.C., and Chicago. Air France has a fleet of 375 aircraft as of December 31, 2004. It has over 1,800 daily flights. Between 2003 and 2004, 43.7 million passengers flew on flights operated by Air France to 189 destinations in 84 countries.

27 March 1951 (Ireland): A Douglas C-47A-75-DL Dakota 3 cargo aircraft operated by Air Transport Charter and en route to Nutts Corner Airport, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, shortly after take-off following the aircraft’s failure to gain height, killing two of the three crew and two of the three passengers.

27 March 1953 (Netherlands): The Royal Netherlands Air Force becomes a separate command.

27 March 1954 (USA): USAF Capt. Berry H. Young, 9th Bomb Squadron, 7th Bomb Wing, lands his Convair B-36H Peacemaker safely at Carswell AFB, Texas, with all three reciprocating engines on the starboard wing inoperative, the outboard jets completely disabled, and the landing flaps inoperative. These problems are further compounded when two engines windmill, without cockpit control, and the landing gear has to be lowered by emergency procedures. This incident becomes known as the &ldquoMiracle Landing.”. In acknowledgement of this feat, the entire crew is awarded the Carswell Crew of the Month Award, and later receives a personal commendation from General Curtis E. LeMay, Commander-In-Chief, Strategic Air Command.

27 March 1958 (USA): A United States Air Force Douglas C-124C Globemaster II (AF 52-0981) collides in midair with a USAF Fairchild C-119C Flying Boxcar (AF 49-0195) over Bridgeport, Texas, United States, killing all 15 on the Globemaster II and all three on the Flying Boxcar.

27 March 1962 (Cuba): A Cubana de Aviacion Ilyushin IL-14 Crate (CU-T819) crashes into the sea about a mile from Santiago, Cuba, killing all 22 aboard.

27 March 1963 (USA): North American T-28A-NI Trojan (AF 52-1242, c/n 189-57) converted to first prototype RA-28 (a proposed turboprop combat version for use in SE Asia), later redesignated North American YAT-28E. To Air Force Special Evaluation Center at Eglin AFB, Florida, for tests. Deficiency in tailfin area (tail unit separated in flight) led to its entering a flat spin and crashing whilst on its 14th test flight, killing North American Aviation pilot George Hoskins when he is unable to bail out due to a jammed canopy.

27 March 1967 (USA): A Douglas A-4 Skyhawk of VA-72 out of NAS Cecil Field, Florida, crashes into a wooded area W of Lake City, Florida after pilot Lt. Cmdr. Robert W. McKay, 34, ejects from the crippled jet. “He suffered no apparent injuries,”, a Navy spokesman said. “He was picked up by the Highway Patrol and will be returned to Cecil Field on a Navy helicopter.”

27 March 1968 (USSR): While on a routine training flight out of Chkalovsky Air Base, Kosmonaut Yuri Gagarin and flight instructor Vladimir Seryogin (Seregin) die in a Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15UTI Midget (c/n 612739, call sign 625) crash near the town of Kirzhach. Gagarin and Seryogin were buried in the walls of the Kremlin on Red Square. It is not certain what caused the crash, but a 1986 inquest suggests that the turbulence from a Sukhoi Su-11 Fishpot-C interceptor using its afterburners may have caused Gagarin’s plane to go out of control. Russian documents declassified in March 2003 showed that the KGB had conducted their own investigation of the accident, in addition to one government and two military investigations. The KGB’s report dismissed various conspiracy theories, instead indicating that the actions of air base personnel contributed to the crash. The report states that an air traffic controller provided Gagarin with outdated weather information, and that when Gagarin flew, conditions had deteriorated significantly. Ground crew also left external fuel tanks attached to the aircraft. His planned flight activities needed clear weather and no outboard tanks. The investigation concluded that Gagarin’s aircraft entered a spin, either due to a bird strike or because of a sudden move to avoid another aircraft. Because of the out-of-date weather report, the crew believed their altitude to be higher than it actually was, and could not properly react to bring the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15UTI Midget out of its spin.

27 March 1969 (USA/Mars): The launch of Mariner 7, one of two robotic probes sent to inspect Mars’ atmosphere and ice caps.

27 March 1970 (France): The Concorde makes its first supersonic flight.

27 March 1975 (Canada): First flight of the de Havilland Canada Dash 7, piloted by Bob Fowler.

27 March 1977 (Canary Islands): In the Tenerife airport disaster, two Boeing 747’s, KLM Flight 4805 (Boeing 747-206B “Rijn”, PH-BUF) and Pan Am Flight 1736 (Boeing 747-121 “Clipper Victor”, N736PA) collide on the runway in Los Rodeos Airport; 583 of 644 people on board both aircraft are killed in the worst accident in the history of commercial aviation.

27 March 1978 (USA): A USN Grumman F-14A-70-GR Tomcat (BuNo 158995, ’NK 106’) of VF-1, crashes and catapults across scrub grass to come to rest against a concrete highway divider on CA-163, the Cabrillo Freeway, on approach to NAS Miramar, San Diego, California, exploding in flames. Both crew members eject seconds before impact; one fatality, no civilian deaths.

27 March 1984 (UK/USA): British Airways inaugurates a Concorde service from London to Miami twice weekly. The service operates through Washington-Dulles, necessitating a 50-minute stopover. The overall trip lasts 6 hours 35 min, a saving approximately 2.5 hours over the direct flight by subsonic airliners. The round-trip fare is quoted a £2,509.

27 March 1990 (Angola): An Angolan Government CASA C-212 Aviocar 300 is shot down near Kuito, Angola by UNITA forces, killing all 25 on board.

27 March 1990 (Afghanistan): An Uzbek Civil Aviation Administration Ilyushin IL-76D Candid (CCCP-78781) stalls on final and crashes before reaching Kabul, Afghanistan. All 11 aboard are killed.

27 March 1994 (Germany): The Eurofighter takes its first flight in Manching, Germany.

27 March 1997 (Thailand): The Royal Thai Navy commissions its first aircraft carrier, HTMS Chakri Naruebet.

27 March 1999 (Serbia): A USAF Lockheed F-117A Nighthawk on a bombing mission over Serbia, was shot down by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia unit using a SA-3 Goa. The pilot ejected and the Lockheed F-117A Nighthawk crashed in hostile territory.

27 March 2003 (Iraq): Hughes OH-58D Kiowa (AF 95-0024) from C Troop, 2-17th Cavalry Regiment crashes in Iraq, pilots survive.

27 March 2004 (Germany): First flight of the Eurofighter Typhoon. The Eurofighter Typhoon is a Twin-engine, canard-delta wing, multirole fighter. The Typhoon was designed by a consortium of three companies, EADS, Alenia Aeronautica and BAE Systems, working through a holding company, Eurofighter GmbH, which was formed in 1986. It was initially introduced into service in 2003. The project is managed by the NATO Eurofighter and Tornado Management Agency, which acts as the prime customer. The Eurofighter Typhoon is being produced serially by the EADS, Alenia Aeronautica, and BAE Systems consortium. The aircraft is being procured under separate contracts, named tranches, each for aircraft with generally improved capabilities. The Typhoon has entered service with the Austrian Air Force, the Italian Air Force, the German Air Force, the British Royal Air Force, the Spanish Air Force, and the Royal Saudi Air Force.

27 March 2004 (USA): NASA’s X-43 pilotless plane breaks world speed record for an atmospheric engine by briefly flying at 7,700 km (4,800 mi) per hour (seven times the speed of sound). The X-43 is an unmanned experimental hypersonic aircraft with multiple planned scale variations meant to test various aspects of hypersonic flight. It was part of NASA’s Hyper-X program and has set several airspeed records for jet-propelled aircraft. The X-43 is the fastest aircraft on record at approx. 7000 miles per hour (10,461 km/h). A winged booster rocket with the X-43 placed on top, called a “stack&rdquo, is launched at speed from a larger carrier plane. After the booster rocket, a modified first stage of the Pegasus rocket, brings the stack to the target speed and altitude, it is discarded, and the X-43 flies free using its own engine, a scramjet.

27 March 2007 (France): The last Airbus A300 leaves the Airbus assembly line.

27 March 2008 (Iraq): An Iraqi military Mil Mi-17 Hip helicopter is shot down during heavy fighting in northern Basra.

27 March 2012 (USA): Aboard JetBlue Airways Flight 191, an Airbus A320-200 flying from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, New York, to McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas, Nevada, the copilot locks Captain Clayton Osbon out of the cockpit after Osbon begins acting erratically, apparently suffering from a panic attack. Passengers subdue Osbon, and the airliner diverts to Amarillo, Texas, where Osbon is arrested.