Cross-Channel Aviation Pioneers - Blanchard and Bleriot, Vikings and Viscounts (Hales-Dutton Bruce)(Pevná vazba)

On 25 July 1909, a dapper, mustachioed Frenchman flying a flimsy, diaphanous airplane changed the status of a great nation. "England is no longer an island," declared the Daily Mail. Lord Northcliffe, the newspaper's proprietor, had put up the 1,000 prize for the first flight of the English Channel by the pilot of an airplane.

In securing the prize for one of aviation's most celebrated firsts, Louis Bl riot had beaten his Anglo-French rival Hubert Latham. Six days earlier, Latham had become the first airman to make a forced landing on water when the engine of his elegant Antoinette monoplane failed while he was attempted the crossing.

In this book, the author explores the many and varied milestones in cross-channel flight, beginning back in July 1785 when John-Pierre Blanchard and John Jeffries made the first crossing, by balloon. Other flyers quickly followed Bl riot
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