RandomFacts Aviation

S.A. Aviation Facts & Activities
Randomfacts is a very new website (I will add more facts when I can).
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Aviation Activity Sheets.
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The NATO Phonetic Alphabet is a standardised set of phonetic pronunciations assigned to each letter of the English alphabet. Developed to ensure clear and unambiguous communication, it is widely used in various sectors such as military operations, aviation, maritime communication, and emergency services.

Aviation Science.
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Aircraft (and wedge tailed eagles) usually take off into the wind. By facing into the wind, the air flows faster over their wings, allowing them to become airborne more easily, especially when they are heavy after eating. This aerodynamic technique helps them gain altitude faster and prevents them from crashing back into the ground. This method gives them better maneuvering control, avoiding the risk of a "downwind departure", which can cause them to crash.

Early South Australian Aviators
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The first flight in Australia was an accident. It occurred by accident in a paddock at Bolivar, South Australia. Frederick Jones, bought a Bleriot Type XI monoplane while on a business trip in England. It arrived at Port Adelaide in February 1910 and was taken to John Martins in Kent Town. Carl 'Bill' Wittber (a mechanic) was employed to assemble it and while he was doing taxiing tests at Bolivar on Sunday 13 March, 1910 it took to the air for a brief time (about 40ft at 5ft in the air).

Early South Australian Women Aviators
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The photo is of Amy Johnson and Brownie Lunn Brownie in a Gypsy Moth believed to be VH-ULO (which is in the collection of the South Australian Aviation Museum). Brownie Lunn gained her pilot's license in May 1933. In May 1934, she became the first Australian woman to complete a night flight, navigating without marked runways using only kerosene tin-can flares.

South Australian Historic Aircraft
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The plane that didn't fly over the Antarctic - When Douglas Mawson was in England in 1911 organising and recruiting personnel for his next Antarctic expedition, he arranged to send a Vickers REP monoplane to South Australia for use on the expedition. During a test flight on October 4 1911 at Adelaide’s Cheltenham racecourse with pilot H.E. Watkins, its petrol tank exploded and the following day it crashed. It was sent south with the expedition, stripped of its wings and metal sheathing from the fuselage and was used as an air tractor towing four sledges.