Aurel Vlaicu (; 19 November 1882 – 13 September 1913) was a Romanian engineer, inventor, airplane constructor and early pilot.Gheorghiu, 1960

Early years and education

Aurel Vlaicu was born in the village of Binținți in

Transylvania Transylvania ( ro, Ardeal or ; hu, Erdély; german: Siebenbürgen) is a historical and cultural region in Central Europe, encompassing central Romania. To the east and south its natural border is the Carpathian Mountains, and to the west the Ap ...

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...

. In 1925, by then part of Romania, it was renamed ''Aurel Vlaicu'', and is now part of

Geoagiu Geoagiu ( hu, Algyógy, german: Gergesdorf) is a town in Hunedoara County, in the historical region of Transylvania, Romania, located on the Mureș River at an altitude of 217 metres above sea level. The river with the same name ( Geoagiu) flows i ...

town. He attended a

Calvinist Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...

high school in Orăștie (renamed Aurel Vlaicu High School in his honor in 1919) and took his

Baccalaureate Baccalaureate may refer to: * ''Baccalauréat'', a French national academic qualification * Bachelor's degree, or baccalaureate, an undergraduate academic degree * English Baccalaureate, a performance measure to assess secondary schools in England ...

Sibiu Sibiu ( , , german: link=no, Hermannstadt , la, Cibinium, Transylvanian Saxon: ''Härmeschtat'', hu, Nagyszeben ) is a city in Romania, in the historical region of Transylvania. Located some north-west of Bucharest, the city straddles the Ci ...

in 1902. He was a high school colleague of

Petru Groza Petru Groza (7 December 1884 – 7 January 1958) was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian politician, best known as the first Prime Minister of the Communist Party-dominated government under Soviet occupation during the early stages of the Commu ...

, and in Sibiu became friends with

Octavian Goga Octavian Goga (; 1 April 1881 – 7 May 1938) was a Romanian politician, poet, playwright, journalist, and translator. Life and politics Goga was born in Rășinari, near Sibiu. Goga was an active member in the Romanian nationalisti ...

. Vlaicu furthered his studies at

Technical University of Budapest Technical may refer to: * Technical (vehicle), an improvised fighting vehicle * Technical analysis, a discipline for forecasting the future direction of prices through the study of past market data * Technical drawing, showing how something is co ...

and Technische Hochschule München in

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, earning his engineer's diploma in 1907. Between 1907 and 1908 Vlaicu served in the Austro-Hungarian Navy, and on September 1, 1908, he took an engineer's position with the Opel car factory in Rüsselsheim.

Aviation career

Vlaicu left Opel in March 1909 and returned to Binţinţi, where, together with his brother, Ion, he built a

glider Glider may refer to: Aircraft and transport Aircraft * Glider (aircraft), heavier-than-air aircraft primarily intended for unpowered flight ** Glider (sailplane), a rigid-winged glider aircraft with an undercarriage, used in the sport of glidin ...

which first flew in the summer of 1909. In October 1909, on the advice of

, he moved to the

Kingdom of Romania The Kingdom of Romania ( ro, Regatul României) was a constitutional monarchy that existed in Romania from 13 March ( O.S.) / 25 March 1881 with the crowning of prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as King Carol I (thus beginning the Romanian ...

, where with help from Romanian-Transylvanian expatriates, he obtained financial support to build his first powered airplane, following a number of demonstration flights with rubber-powered models in front of Romanian government officials and journalists. On November 1, 1909, he began the construction of his first powered airplane, the '' A. Vlaicu Nr. I'' at the Army Arsenal in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than north of ...

with funding from the Romanian Ministry of War and on a 300 lei monthly stipend from the Minister of Public Education. ''A. Vlaicu Nr. I'' flew for the first time on June 17, 1910, over Cotroceni airfield. On September 28, 1910, as a part of the fall military exercises, Vlaicu flew his airplane from Slatina to Piatra Olt carrying a message, an early instance of an airplane being used for military purposes. The construction of ''A. Vlaicu Nr. II'' was started in December 1910 on a budget of 16,000 lei and first flew in April 1911. Between 23 and 30 June 1912 Vlaicu competed with it at the International Flight Week in

Aspern Aspern () is part of Donaustadt, the 22nd district of Vienna, Austria. History The area is known because of the Battle of Aspern-Essling, which was fought in the nearby Lobau on 21 and 22 May 1809. In that battle, the Austrian army, led by A ...

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

(Die internationale Flugwoche in Wien), against 42 other aviators, including Roland Garros. Vlaicu won prizes totaling 7,500

Austro-Hungarian krone The crown (german: Krone, hu, korona, it, Corona, pl, korona, sl, krona, sh, kruna, cz, koruna, sk, koruna, ro, coroană) was the official currency of Austria-Hungary from 1892 (when it replaced the florin as part of the adoption of the ...

for precision landing, projectile throwing and tight flying around a pole. On this occasion, he was issued the FAI pilot license number 52. On return from Aspern he flew demonstration flights throughout Transylvania. ''A. Vlaicu Nr. III'' was a two-seat monoplane having a fully cowled

Gnome Gamma The Gnome 7 Gamma was a French designed, seven-cylinder, air-cooled rotary aero engine. Powering several pre-World War I era aircraft types it produced 70 horsepower (52 kW) from its capacity of 12 litres (680 cubic inches ...

engine. Built on contract for the

Marconi Company The Marconi Company was a British telecommunications and engineering company that did business under that name from 1963 to 1987. Its roots were in the Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company founded by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 189 ...

for experiments with aerial radio, at the time of Vlaicu's death it was only partially finished. It was completed by his friends and several short test flights were made during 1914 by military pilot Petre Macavei. Further tests were hindered by the unusual controls. In 1916, during the German occupation of Bucharest, the aircraft was seized and shipped to Germany, and it was last seen in 1942 at an aviation exhibition in Berlin by Romanian military officers, though no mention of it is made in references on the Berlin exhibition.

Vlaicu airplanes design

During his short career, Aurel Vlaicu designed and built one glider and three airplanes of his own design. He perfected his design on rubber band powered models he began experimenting with while a student in Munich. Vlaicu's three powered airplanes had one central aluminium tubing, the flight controls in front, two counter-rotating propellers, one mounted ahead of the nacelle, and the other to the rear of the wing up high, partially counteracting each other's torque. They employ tricycle-landing gears with independent trailing arm suspension, had brakes on the rear wheel, and were equipped with Gnome

rotary engine The rotary engine is an early type of internal combustion engine, usually designed with an odd number of cylinders per row in a radial configuration. The engine's crankshaft remained stationary in operation, while the entire crankcase and its ...

s. His airplanes lacked ailerons, relying on just rudder and elevators for control, via a steering wheel mounted on a tiller. The wheel controlled the elevators while sideways motion of the tiller controlled the rudder. The wheel could be temporarily locked with the help of two dowels. The low center of gravity provided by the

parasol wing A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing confi ...

allowed for the lateral stability that this type of control system requires.

Death

Aurel Vlaicu died on September 13, 1913, near

Câmpina Câmpina () is a municipiu, city in Prahova County, Romania, north of the county seat Ploiești, located on the main route between Wallachia and Transylvania. Its existence is first attested in a document of 1503. It is situated in the historical r ...

, on the outskirts of Bănești commune while attempting to be the first to fly across the Carpathian Mountains in his now aged ''A. Vlaicu Nr. II''. He was expected to participate in the ASTRA festivities in

Orăștie Orăștie (; german: link=no, Broos, hu, Szászváros, la, Saxopolis) is a city in Hunedoara County, south-western Transylvania, central Romania. History 7th–9th century – On the site of an old swamp was a human settlement, now ...

, near Binţinţi. He was buried in

Bellu Cemetery Șerban Vodă Cemetery (commonly known as Bellu Cemetery) is the largest and most famous cemetery in Bucharest, Romania. It is located on a plot of land donated to the local administration by Baron Barbu Bellu. It has been in use since 1858. Th ...

, in Bucharest and was posthumously elected to the

Romanian Academy The Romanian Academy ( ro, Academia Română ) is a cultural forum founded in Bucharest, Romania, in 1866. It covers the scientific, artistic and literary domains. The academy has 181 active members who are elected for life. According to its byl ...

in 1948. The cause of Vlaicu's crash remains unsolved. Vlaicu's friends Giovanni Magnani and Constantin Silisteanu dismissed claims of sabotage, the two being among the first to inspect the wreckage as they were following him in an automobile. The most plausible cause of Vlaicu's death was that the airplane stalled while landing with the engine off (as it was common practice at the time, landings were made with the engine off, however this made it difficult for the pilot to abort a misjudged landing).

Legacy

17 June, the day of Aurel Vlaicu's first powered flight, is celebrated as The National Aviation Day of Romania. His name is listed second on the Romanian Airmen Heroes Memorial in Bucharest, after

Gheorghe Caranda Gheorghe Caranda (April 21, 1884 – June 20, 1912) was a Romanian army officer and early aviator. He registered at Cotroceni Piloting School founded by George Valentin Bibescu in 1911, and earned his pilot license in 1912. On June 20, 1912 h ...

and before his friend and fellow pilot, Gheorghe Negel, who died in an aircraft crash one month after Vlaicu, on October 11, 1913. A museum was established in his home village, now named Aurel Vlaicu. and a monument was erected near Bănești where he crashed his plane. The second largest airport in Romania, a TAROM Airbus A318-111 and the Aurel Vlaicu University, a public university founded in 1991 in Arad are all named after him. The 50

Romanian lei The Romanian leu (, plural lei ; ISO code: RON; numeric code: 946) is the currency of Romania. It is subdivided into 100 (, singular: ), a word that means "money" in Romanian. Etymology The name of the currency means "lion", and is derive ...

banknote has a portrait of Vlaicu on the

obverse Obverse and its opposite, reverse, refer to the two flat faces of coins and some other two-sided objects, including paper money, flags, seals, medals, drawings, old master prints and other works of art, and printed fabrics. In this usage, ...

, and on the reverse a drawing of one of his airplanes and a cross-section of the airplane's engine. A commemorative 50

bani Bani may refer to: Places Africa *Bani Department, a department in the Séno Province of Burkina Faso *Bani, Bani, Séno, Burkina Faso * Bani, Bourzanga, Bam, Burkina Faso *Bani, Gnagna, Burkina Faso * Bani, The Gambia *Bani River, a tributary ...

coin was issued by the Romanian National Bank in 2010. A

Bucharest Metro The Bucharest Metro ( ro, Metroul din București) is an underground rapid transit system that serves Bucharest, the capital of Romania. It first opened for service on 16 November 1979. The network is run by Metrorex. One of two parts of the large ...

train station, Aurel Vlaicu metro station is named in memory of him. His life was the subject of the novels "Maistorasul Aurel, ucenicul lui Dumnezeu: Cronica vremii si vietii lui Vlaicu" by Victor Ion Popa (published in 1939) and "Flăcăul din Binţinţi" by Constantin Ghiban (published in 1953),Constantin Ghiban (1953) "Flacăul din Binţinţi" Editura Militara a Ministerului Fortelor Armte ale R.P.R.
/ref> and of a movie by

Mircea Drăgan Mircea Drăgan (3 October 1932 – 31 October 2017) was a Romanian film director. He directed 23 films between 1955 and 1992. His 1961 film ''Thirst (1961 film), Thirst'' was entered into the 2nd Moscow International Film Festival where it w ...

(released in 1978). In 2010 a museum in Deva ordered several hundreds mugs to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Vlaicu's first powered flight. The mug designers used a pictured uploaded to Wikipedia showing another Romanian aviation pioneer,

Traian Vuia Traian Vuia or Trajan Vuia (; August 17, 1872 – September 3, 1950) was a Romanian inventor and aviation pioneer who designed, built and tested the first tractor monoplane. He was the first to demonstrate that a flying machine could rise into the ...

, which was wrongly labelled as Aurel Vlaicu (Wikipedia upload picture name ''Aurel Vlaicu avionul''). As of May 2018, the incorrect picture is still used on several websites.Archived a
Ghostarchive
and th
Wayback Machine

References

Bibliography

* *

External links

Aurel Vlaicu on Orăștie website [in romanian]]

Aurel Vlaicu article by Valeriu Avram [in romanian]]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vlaicu, Aurel Aurel Vlaicu, 1882 births 1913 deaths People from Geoagiu Austro-Hungarian emigrants to Romania Members of the Romanian Academy elected posthumously Romanian Austro-Hungarians Romanian aviators Romanian aerospace engineers Romanian inventors Aviation history of Romania Aviation inventors Aviation pioneers Burials at Bellu Cemetery Aviators killed in aviation accidents or incidents in Romania Technical University of Munich alumni Inventors killed by their own invention Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1913