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Only 65 years separate the Wright brothers' first powered flight, 37 m (120 ft) in 12 seconds on 17 December 1903, from the Moon landing of July 1969. Neil Armstrong carried a piece of the Wright Flyer's wing fabric and a sliver of its propeller wood with him to the Moon.

Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

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Aviation moved fast between those dates. In 1919 John Alcock and Arthur Brown made the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic. In 1947 Chuck Yeager flew faster than sound in the rocket-powered Bell X-1. In 1957 the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, and in 1961 Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space. Orville Wright, who piloted that first flight, lived until 1948. The Flyer itself spent 20 years at the Science Museum in London: the Smithsonian Institution had credited its former head, Samuel Langley, with the first machine capable of flight, and Orville sent the Flyer abroad in protest. It returned to the United States in 1948 and is on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington. In 2021 another scrap of its wing fabric flew on Mars, fixed to NASA's Ingenuity helicopter.

Türkçe oku
İlk motorlu uçuştan Ay'a inişe yalnızca 65 yıl geçti: Wright kardeşlerin uçağı 17 Aralık 1903'te 12 saniyede 37 metre (120 ft) uçmuştu, Apollo 11 ise Temmuz 1969'da Ay'a indi. Neil Armstrong, Wright Flyer'ın kanat kumaşından ve pervanesinin ahşabından birer küçük parçayı yanında Ay'a götürdü.

Bu iki tarih arasında havacılık hızla ilerledi. 1919'da John Alcock ile Arthur Brown Atlantik'i ilk kez aralıksız uçarak geçti. 1947'de Chuck Yeager, roket motorlu Bell X-1 ile ses hızını aştı. 1957'de Sovyetler Birliği ilk yapay uydu Sputnik'i fırlattı; 1961'de Yuri Gagarin uzaya çıkan ilk insan oldu. İlk uçuşun pilotu Orville Wright 1948'e kadar yaşadı. Flyer ise yirmi yıl Londra'daki Bilim Müzesi'nde kaldı: Smithsonian Enstitüsü uçabilen ilk makineyi eski başkanı Samuel Langley'nin yaptığını ileri sürüyordu, Orville de buna tepki olarak uçağı yurt dışına gönderdi. Uçak 1948'de ABD'ye döndü ve bugün Washington'daki Ulusal Hava ve Uzay Müzesi'nde sergileniyor. 2021'de kanat kumaşından bir parça daha, NASA'nın Ingenuity helikopterine bağlı olarak Mars'ta uçtu.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Wright Flyer
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Less than 66 years, well within a single lifetime, separate the first powered aeroplane flight from the first Moon landing. Orville Wright flew for 12 seconds and 37 metres on 17 December 1903; Apollo 11 landed on the Moon on 20 July 1969.

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