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unusual facts about glider



80th Troop Carrier Squadron

The squadron participated in the D-Day operation, dropping 101st Airborne Division paratroops near Sainte-Mère-Église on the Cotentin Peninsula in pre-dawn hours and towing gliders with 82nd Airborne Division paratroops at dusk to drop zones just inland from Utah Beach, then carried out re-supply drops and glider delivery missions the following day.

Air Landing Regiment

Although gliders needed a certain amount of ground to land the soldiers aboard arrived in larger groups (the Horsa glider carried a complete platoon ready for combat.

Airways Airsports

(2011) Judy Leden takes BBC Breakfast Weather reporter Carol Kirkwood flying in a hang glider to see a cloud close up and weight it, for BBC's The Great British Weather Show.

Akaflieg Berlin B13

The Akaflieg Berlin B13 is a two-seat motor-glider designed and built in Germany.

Akaflieg Köln LS11

After the Akaflieg Darmstadt D-41 demonstrated the feasibility of a high performance, multiplace glider based on the LS6 wing, the Köln Akafliegers felt they could profit from and improve upon that design.

Armstrong Whitworth Albemarle

Heavy Glider Conversion Unit at RAF Brize Norton and RAF North Luffenham from January to April 1943 and August 1944 to October 1944 when it became No. 21 Heavy Glider Conversion Unit.

Buxton Hjordis

It had been designed and built for the well-known British glider pilot, Philip Wills, and he flew it at the British National Gliding Competitions at Sutton Bank in September 1935.

Conn Standish O'Grady

He was an active glider pilot as late as the 1950s, belonging to the Newcastle Gliding Club.

DFS SG 38 Schulgleiter

The SG 38 was designed to be a training glider for basic flight training by the Nationalsozialistisches Fliegerkorps (NSFK).

Dynamic soaring

In his 1975 book Streckensegelflug (published in English in 1978 as Cross-Country Soaring by the Soaring Society of America), Helmut Reichmann describes a flight made by Ingo Renner in a Glasflügel H-301 Libelle glider over Tocumwal in Australia on 24 October 1974.

Earl R. Southee

He was a founder of the Soaring Society of America (1931) and managed 'Glider Meets' (National Gliding and Soaring Championships), at Elmira, New York, during the mid to late 1930s.

EFW N-20

The N-20 design was not produced, both the single Aiguillon and Arbalète airframes survive and are on public display at the Flieger-Flab-Museum, Dübendorf, the glider test aircraft was destroyed in an accident.

El Calafate

The gliding altitude record of 50,722 feet (15,460 m) was set near El Calafate on 30 August 2006 by Steve Fossett and Einar Enevoldson in their 'Perlan' high altitude research glider.

Eliot Noyes

While at Harvard, Noyes was also a member of the Harvard soaring club and flew the club's new Schweizer Aircraft-built SGU1-7 glider.

Flight 143

Air Canada Flight 143, which became known as the "Gimli Glider" after it landed at Gimli Air Force Base on July 22, 1983, having glided 80 miles after running out of fuel

Fred Slingsby

His first glider, in 1931, was a Falcon, which was a British version of the RRG Falke, built by Rhön-Rossitten Gesellschaft and designed by Alexander Lippisch.

Gomolzig Flugzeug- und Maschinenbau GmbH

Gomolzig is a German aircraft and engineering manufacturer based in Schwelm, Koblenz and Breitscheid, that services and has built under license a variety of powered and glider aircraft.

ICA IS-28

On April 7, 1979, Tom Knauff and R. Tawse set a world record with the IS-28 B2 glider, covering a distance of 829 kilometres on a predetermined out-and-return course from the Ridge Soaring Gliderport in Julian, Pennsylvania.

IS-4 Jastrząb

The IS-4 Jastrząb (Instytut Szybownictwa – gliding institute) was a single-seat aerobatic glider designed and built in Poland from 1949.

Klaus Holighaus

Fellow students Gerhard Waibel and Wolf Lemke had already developed the D-36 glider and he contributed to its refinement.

Laurinburg-Maxton Army Air Base

In addition to the flying training glider pilots were trained in firing the M1 carbine; "Bazooka" rocket launchers, various sub-machine guns (M3, Thompson), 60 and 80mm mortars, and the use of hand grenades.

Lilienthal Gliding Medal

The first winner of the Lilienthal Gliding Medal in the world was Tadeusz Góra for his record-breaking 577.8-kilometer flight on May 18, 1938, glider PWS-101 from Bezmiechowa to Soleczniki (near Vilnius).

Mizuno Shinryu

The Navy showed some consideration for the Shinryu as it was given the title of 'Navy Special Attack Glider'.

Moyes Tempest

The Moyes Tempest, also referred to as the Bailey/Moyes Tempest, is an Australian high-wing, strut-braced, single-seat, microlift glider that was designed by Bob Bailey of Florida, United States and produced by Moyes Microlights of Waverley, New South Wales, Australia.

NASA Paresev

Publicity on the Paresev and the Ryan XV-8 "Flying Jeep" aircraft inspired hobbyists to adapt Rogallo's flexible wing airfoil onto elementary hang gliders leading to the most successful hang glider configuration in history.

Opel-RAK

The Lippisch Ente a rocket-powered glider was produced on June 11, 1928, piloted by Fritz Stamer, but is not usually considered part of the series.

Operation Dingson

On 5 August 1944, 10 Waco CG-4 gliders towed by aircraft of 298 Squadron and 644 Squadron transported the French SAS men and armed jeeps to Brittany near Vannes (Locoal-Mendon), each glider carrying 3 SAS troopers and a jeep which carried two Vickers K machine guns plus explosives, sten guns and a Piat antitank gun.The gliders were escorted by 32 Spitfires for part of the trip.

Operation Sigma Sigma

The group offered the Sigma up to further development by other parties, selecting a proposal by David Marsden a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Alberta (on sabbatical at Cranfield Institute of Technology and a glider pilot holding records with his own glider designs such as the Marsden Gemini).

Oxford University Gliding Club

OUGC currently owns one ASK 21 two-seat glider, GAM, one single-seat Schleicher K 8 glider, HYX, and one Grob Astir CS, FEF, although members can also use gliders belonging to the Windrushers Gliding Club, the civilian gliding club that took over Bicester Airfield when the RAF left in 2004.

This wood and fabric glider was soon supplemented by a Grob G103 Twin II glass fibre two-seater, EGN, again via a loan from Pratelli, and the Ka 7 eventually moved on to another club.

Peyret Tandem

After Itford Maneyrol increased the world glider duration record in the Peyret Tandem to 485 minutes at Vauville on 23 January 1923.

RAF Northleach

Glider Training School left RAF Stoke Orchard and RAF Northleach for good relocating to RAF Exeter, Devon and its satellite of RAF Culmhead, Somerset.

RAF Saltby

Flying continues today as Buckminster Gliding Club operates 7 days a week from Saltby Airfield using about half of the main runway (07/25) The club specializes in gliding, motor gliding and glider aerobatics.

Rogallo wing

The Charles Richard design and use of the Rogallo wing in the Paresev project resulted in an assemblage that became the stark template for the standard Rogallo hang-glider wing that would blanket the world of the sport in the early 1970s.

Schempp

Martin Schempp (1905–1984), glider pilot and founder of Schempp-Hirth, a major manufacturer of gliders

Schempp-Hirth, glider manufacturer based in Kirchheim unter Teck, Germany

Timeline of aviation – 20th century

March 16–20 - Daniel Maloney is launched by balloon in a tandem-wing glider designed by John Montgomery and makes three successful flights at Aptos, CA, the highest launch being at 3,000 feet with an 18 minute descent to a predetermined landing location.

Travis Air Force Base Heritage Center

This section of the museum houses exhibits on the Flying Tigers, the Doolittle Raid, Women Airforce Service Pilots, a Fat Man atomic bomb, and two aircraft displays, a L-4 Grasshopper and Waco CG-4 glider.

Two Seater and Retro Glider Aerobatic Cup Zbraslavice

Two Seater and Retro Glider Aerobatic Cup Zbraslavice is a special combined aerobatic competition, held at Zbraslavice Airport in the Czech Republic.

Upavon

With the only permanent RAF unit based there being No. 622 Volunteer Gliding Squadron, providing glider training to members of the Air Cadet Organisation.

W.W.S.3 Delfin

Salamandra and W.W.S.2 Żaba, Wacław Czerwiński designed an all wood glider with smooth lines derived from wind tunnel tests at the Lwów Technical University.

WACO Primary Glider

Experimental Aircraft Association founder Paul Poberezny founder first learned to fly in a rebuilt WACO Primary glider.

Wellingborough School

Wellingborough School RAF section is linked to No. 5 Air Experience Flight at RAF Wyton, where cadets are flown on Friday afternoons in the Grob Tutor training aircraft, and to 616 Volunteer Gliding Squadron, at RAF Henlow in Bedfordshire, where cadets go on Sundays to fly in the Grob Vigilant motor glider, and where Flt Lt Walker is a C Category instructor.

Wilhelm Fulda

Fulda was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross for his actions as a glider pilot during the attack on the Isthmus of Corinth, Greece.

Wladimir Talanczuk

Throughout 1979 he was a member of the Polish National Hang Gliding Team and competed in the World Hang Gliding Championships at Grenoble, France, flying a Mars hang glider of his own design.

Yellow-bellied glider

The yellow-bellied glider's diet consists of nectar, honeydew, insects, pollen and a wide spread of tree sap including different Eucalyptus sap, Corymbia sap, some Angophora sap, and Lophostemon sap.


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