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March 9
In 1918… The first American air casualty in World War I is Capt. James E. Miller who loses his life in a French Spad while flying a practice patrol across the German lines.
In 1919… U.S. Navy Lt. Comdr. E. O. McDonnell makes the first successful flight from a gun turret platform on a U.S. navy battleship. The USS Texas is anchored in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba for the test.
In 1928… The English aviatrix Lady Mary Bailey takes off from Croydon on what becomes the first round-trip flight between London and Cape Town, South Africa flown by a woman. She arrives back in England on May 12.
Today is the Birthday of Yuri Gagarin Born in 1934,He was a Soviet cosmonaut and the first human in space died in 1968
On 12 April 1961, Gagarin became the first man to travel into space, launching to orbit aboard the Vostok 3KA-3 . During his flight, Gagarin famously whistled the tune “The Motherland Hears, The Motherland Knows” The first two lines of the song are: “The Motherland hears, the Motherland knows/Where her son flies in the sky”. This patriotic song was written by Dmitri Shostakovich in 1951
Around the same time, some Western sources claimed that Gagarin, during his space flight, had made the comment, “I don’t see any God up here.” However, no such words appear in the verbatim record of Gagarin’s conversations with the Earth during the spaceflight. In a 2006 interview a close friend of Gagarin, Colonel Valentin Petrov, stated that Gagarin never said such words, and that the phrase originated from Nikita Khrushchev’s speech at the plenum of the Central Committee where the anti-religious propaganda was discussed. In a certain context Khrushchev said, “Gagarin flew into space, but didn’t see any God there”. Colonel Petrov also said that Gagarin had been baptised into the Orthodox Church as a child.
In 1938… A new parachute descent record of 35,450ft. is achieved by the French parachutist James Williams when he jumps from the cockpit of an ANF 113 high-wing monoplane after taking off from the airfield at Chartres. Dropping to a height above the ground of 650 ft. in 2 minutes 50 seconds before opening his parachute, Williams easily achieves a world free-fall record.
1967 – Trans World Airlines Flight 553, a Douglas DC-9-15, crashes in a field in Concord Township, Ohio following a mid-air collision with a Beechcraft Baron, killing 26.

And that’s what happened today March 9th in Aviation history , See you tomorrow!

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