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1917 Aerial Target
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) include both autonomous (capable of operating without human input) Drone (aircraft), drones and remotely piloted vehicles (RPVs). The UAVs used in World War I were RPVs. Soon after its change from the Army Balloon Factory to the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Royal Aircraft Factory in 1912, designers at this Farnborough base turned their thoughts to flying an unmanned aircraft. During the First World War this pioneering work resulted in trials of Radio control, remotely controlled aircraft for the Royal Flying Corps and unmanned boats for the Royal Navy that were controlled from 'mother' aircraft. By the end of the war Britain had flown and controlled a drone aircraft and a number of fast unmanned motor boats operating in close flotilla formation that had been individually controlled by radio from operators flying in 'mother' aircraft. The work continued in the interwar years. The Factory 1914 design There is a Royal Aircraft Factory engineering drawin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drone (aircraft)
An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or unmanned aircraft system (UAS), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft with no human Aircraft pilot, pilot, crew, or passengers onboard, but rather is controlled remotely or is autonomous.De Gruyter Handbook of Drone Warfare; 2024. e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-074203-9.H. Pan; M. Zahmatkesh; F. Rekabi-Bana; F. Arvin; J. HuT-STAR: Time-Optimal Swarm Trajectory Planning for Quadrotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 2025. UAVs were originally developed through the twentieth century for military missions too "dull, dirty or dangerous" for humans, and by the twenty-first, they had become essential assets to most militaries. As control technologies improved and costs fell, their use expanded to many non-military applications. These include aerial photography, area coverage,F. Rekabi-Bana; Hu, J.; T. Krajník; Arvin, F.,Unified Robust Path Planning and Optimal Trajectory Generation for Efficient 3D A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sopwith Sparrow
The Sopwith Sparrow was a manned light aircraft developed from the Sopwith A.T. (''Aerial Target'') drone and was powered by a ABC Gnat engine. References * {{Sopwith Aviation Company aircraft Sparrow Biplanes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Munitions Inventions Department
The Munitions Inventions Department (MID) of the British Ministry of Munitions was created during the First World War in 1915. Its administrative structure encompassed university and industrial laboratories, private workshops, and military experimental grounds. The department made use of the experimental facilities of other government agencies, including the National Physical Laboratory at Bushy House and the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR). Two sister organisations were formed: The Board of Invention and Research (BIR) which was established in July 1915 to support the Admiralty, and the Air Inventions Committee (AIC), which supported the Air Board once it became become fully operational in the summer of 1917. Predecessors The readiness of the British military to tap the inventiveness of the public can be dated back to the eighteenth century. Two War Office committees, the Colonels' Committee and the Field Officers' Committee had been convened in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dirigible
An airship, dirigible balloon or dirigible is a type of aerostat ( lighter-than-air) aircraft that can navigate through the air flying under its own power. Aerostats use buoyancy from a lifting gas that is less dense than the surrounding air to achieve the lift needed to stay airborne. In early dirigibles, the lifting gas used was hydrogen, due to its high lifting capacity and ready availability, but the inherent flammability led to several fatal accidents that rendered hydrogen airships obsolete. The alternative lifting gas, helium gas is not flammable, but is rare and relatively expensive. Significant amounts were first discovered in the United States and for a while helium was only available for airship usage in North America. Most airships built since the 1960s have used helium, though some have used hot air. The envelope of an airship may form the gasbag, or it may contain a number of gas-filled cells. An airship also has engines, crew, and optionally also payload ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). Following the Allies of World War I, Allied victory over the Central Powers in 1918, the RAF emerged as the largest air force in the world at the time. Since its formation, the RAF has played History of the Royal Air Force, a significant role in Military history of the United Kingdom, British military history. In particular, during the Second World War, the RAF established Air supremacy, air superiority over Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain, and led the Allied strategic bombing effort. The RAF's mission is to support the objectives of the British Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom), Ministry of Defence (MOD), which are to "provide the capabilities nee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brocks Fireworks
Brock's Fireworks Ltd is a manufacturer of fireworks, founded in London and subsequently based in Hemel Hempstead, Dumfriesshire and Norfolk. History Brock's was founded in 1698 in Islington by John Brock, and is the oldest British firework manufacturer. John Brock died on 5 November 1720 aged 43 and is buried at St James's Church, Clerkenwell, London. In 1825 the factory was located in a residential area in Baker's Row (now Vallance Road), Whitechapel, London: it was destroyed when a boy who was ramming gunpowder into a firework accidentally created a spark which ignited it, and threw it aside as he ran out in fright. Fifty pounds of gunpowder and a large amount of Niter, saltpetre exploded immediately, blowing the roof off, setting fire to the building, and smashing every pane of glass in most of the adjoining streets. The company established a presence in south London, in South Norwood and Sutton, London, Sutton and developed an association with the Crystal Palace, devising p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stratford, London
Stratford is a town and district of West Ham, East London, England, in the London Borough of Newham. Part of the Lower Lea Valley, it is northeast of Charing Cross, and includes Maryland and East Village. Historically an ancient parish in the hundred of Becontree in Essex, following the reform of local government in London in 1965 it became part of the borough of Newham in the newly formed Greater London. Stratford grew rapidly in the 19th century after the railway came to the area in 1839, forming part of the conurbation of London, similar to much of south-west Essex. The late 20th century was a period of severe economic decline in the area, eventually reversed by ongoing regeneration associated with the 2012 Summer Olympics, for which Stratford's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, part of the large, multi-purpose Stratford City development, was the principal venue. The Westfield Stratford City shopping centre, one of the largest urban shopping centres in Europe, opened in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Arthur Brock
Wing commander (rank), Wing Commander Frank Arthur Brock (29 June 1884 – 23 April 1918) was a United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, British officer commissioned into the Royal Artillery, the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) and finally, when the RNAS merged with the RFC, the Royal Air Force. He invented the explosive bullet that destroyed the German Zeppelins and he devised and executed the smoke screen used during the Zeebrugge Raid on 23 April 1918, an attempt by the Royal Navy to block the Belgium, Belgian port of Bruges-Zeebrugge during the First World War. Background Brock was born in South Norwood, Surrey, the son of Arthur Brock of Haredon, Sutton, London, Sutton, Surrey, of the famous Brocks Fireworks, C.T. Brock & Co. fireworks manufacturers. He was educated at Dulwich College where he blew up a stove in his form room. Brock joined the family business in 1901 (later becoming a director) where he remained until the outbreak of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
London Biggin Hill Airport
London Biggin Hill Airport is a minor Commercial aviation, commercial airport serving Biggin Hill in the London Borough of Bromley, located south-southeast of Central London. It specialises in general aviation, handling a spectrum of traffic from private aviation to large business jets. It currently has no scheduled airline service, as flights using the airport are not regularly permitted to carry fare-paying passengers. The airport was formerly a Royal Air Force station RAF Biggin Hill, and a small enclave on the airport still retains that designation. Biggin Hill is best known for its role during the Battle of Britain in the World War II, Second World War, when it served as one of the principal fighter aircraft, fighter bases protecting London and South East England from attack by Nazi Germany, German Luftwaffe bombers. Over the course of the war, fighters based at Biggin Hill claimed 1,400 enemy aircraft, at the cost of the lives of 453 Biggin Hill based aircrew. The airp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RAF Northolt
Royal Air Force Northolt or more simply RAF Northolt is a Royal Air Force List of Royal Air Force stations, station in South Ruislip, from Uxbridge in the London Borough of Hillingdon, western Greater London, England, approximately north of Heathrow Airport. As London VIP Airport, the station handles many private civil flights (private planes of up to 29 passengers) in addition to Air Force flights. Northolt has one runway in operation, spanning , with a grooved Asphalt concrete, asphalt surface. This airport is used for government and VIP transport to and from London. Northolt predates the establishment of the Royal Air Force by almost three years, having opened in May 1915, making it the oldest RAF base. Originally established for the Royal Flying Corps, it has the longest history of continuous use of any RAF airfield. Before the outbreak of the Second World War, the station was the first to take delivery of the Hawker Hurricane. The station played a key role during the B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RAF Upavon
Royal Air Force Upavon, or more simply RAF Upavon, is a former Royal Air Force station in Wiltshire, England. It was a grass airfield, military flight training school, and administrative headquarters of the Royal Air Force. The station opened in 1912 and closed in 1993, when it was transferred to the British Army and became known as Trenchard Lines. The station motto was ''In Principio Et Semper'', and translated from Latin means "In the Beginning and Always". History Origins and construction Construction began on 19 June 1912, on some training gallops, on an elevated site about east of Upavon village, near the edge of the Salisbury Plain, in the English county of Wiltshire. Upavon Airfield was originally created for pilots of the military and naval wings of the newly formed Royal Flying Corps (RFC), and became home to the Army Central Flying School. Captain Godfrey M Paine, RN, became the first commandant, with Major Hugh Trenchard being his assistant. Trenchard later b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geoffrey De Havilland
Captain (British Army and Royal Marines), Captain Sir Geoffrey de Havilland, (27 July 1882 – 21 May 1965) was an English aviation pioneer and aerospace engineer. De Havilland, The aircraft company he founded produced the de Havilland Mosquito, Mosquito, which has been considered the most versatile warplane ever built,Davenport-Hines, Richard. "Havilland, Sir Geoffrey de (1882–1965)." ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''. Ed. H.C.G. Matthew and Brian Harrison. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004Oxford University and his de Havilland Comet, Comet was the first jet airliner to go into production. Early life Born at Magdala House, Terriers, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, de Havilland was the second son of The Reverend Charles de Havilland (1854–1920) and his first wife, Alice Jeannette (née Saunders; 1854–1911). He was educated at King Edward VI College, Nuneaton, Nuneaton Grammar School, St Edward's School, Oxford and the Crystal Palace School, Crystal Palace S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
