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THE AIRPLANE INDUSTRY

The BeginningsThe first form of man-made flying objects were kites. The earliest known

record of kite flying is from around 200 BC in China, when a general flew akite over enemy territory to calculate the length of tunnel required to enter theregion.

Leonardo da Vinci's dream of flight found expression in several designs,but he did not attempt to demonstrate his ideas by actually constructing

them.On 21 November, the Montgolfiers launched the first free flight with humanpassengers. King Louis XVI had originally decreed that condemned criminalswould be the first pilots, but Jean-Franois Piltre de Rozier, successfullypetitioned for the honor. They drifted 8 km in a balloon powered by a woodfire.

Heavier than airThe Wrights made the first sustained, controlled, powered heavier-than-air manned flight at Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, four miles (8 km) south ofKitty Hawk, North Carolina on December 17, 1903.

The first flight by Orville Wright, of 120 feet (37 m) in 12 seconds, wasrecorded in a famous photograph. In the fourth flight of the same day, Wilbur

Wright flew 852 feet (260 m) in 59 seconds.

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THE COLD WAR BENEFITS

After World War II, commercial aviation grew rapidly, using mostly ex-military

aircraft to transport people and cargo.

In October 1947 Chuck Yeager took the rocket-powered Bell X-1 through thesound barrier.

In 1961, the sky was no longer the limit for manned flight, as YuriGagarin orbited once around the planet within 108 minutes, and then used the

descent module of Vostok I to safely reenter the atmosphere and reduce speedfrom Mach 25 using friction and converting velocity into heat.

In the same year that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin set foot on the moon, andBoeing unveiled the Boeing 747 and the Arospatiale-BAC Concorde supersonicpassenger airliner had its maiden flight. The Boeing 747 was the largest commercialpassenger aircraft ever to fly, and still carries millions of passengers each year,

though it has been superseded by the Airbus A380, which is capable of carrying upto 853 passengers.

The last quarter of the 20th century saw a slowing of the pace of advancement.No longer was revolutionary progress made in flight speeds, distances andtechnology.

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2001PRESENT

On September 11, stunned flight attendants and pilots learned that workplacesjust like theirs had been transformed into lethal missiles.The September 11catastrophe hit the airline industry hard, but it also opened the door for airlines toaccelerate the restructuring they already had underway.

After the events of 9/11, the domestic commercial airline industry went into a

precipitous freefall, prompting consolidation of several airlines and bankruptcies ofothers. Elimination of airlines, through consolidation or bankruptcy, benefit bothrevenues--through higher fares--and costs by eliminating redundant expenses androutes. Additional terrorist attacks or declines in the overall domestic economy couldaccelerate consolidation as weaker airlines get acquired by financially stronger onesor become insolvent.

In commercial aviation, the early 21st century saw the end of an era with theretirement of Concorde. Only commercially viable in niche markets, the planes wererequired to fly over the oceans if they wanted to break the sound barrier. Concordewas fuel hungry and could carry a limited amount of passengers due to its highlystreamlined design. Nevertheless, it seems to have made a significant operatingprofit for British Airways.