AHSA Videos – Page 2 – Aviation Historical Society of Australia

DerekB25/05/202208/11/2022

AHSA Monthly Meeting 25 May 2022 (WGCDR Philip Beanland: RAAF 100 Squadron)

Our Melbourne monthly meeting on 25 May 2022, in collaboration with the Friends of Air Force History and Heritage, was held in person at...

DerekB27/04/202208/11/2022

AHSA Monthly Meeting 27 April 2022 (Leigh Edmonds: Norman Brearly and West Australian Airways)

Our Melbourne monthly meeting on 27 April 2022 was held in person at the RAAF Association meeting room in Hawthorn and also “broadcast” to...

DerekB23/03/202208/11/2022

AHSA Monthly Meeting 23 March 2022 (WGCDR Mathew Shelley: The RAAF Museum and the New Vision For the Museum’s Future)

Our March 2022 Melbourne meeting, held in collaboration with the Friends of Air Force History and Heritage, was held in person at the RAAF...

DerekB23/02/202208/11/2022

AHSA Monthly Meeting 23 February 2022 (Michael Smith: Commemorative Flight From London to Darwin, 2019)

Our February 2022 Melbourne meeting, was held in person at the RAAF Association meeting rooms in Hawthorn and also “broadcast” to interstate members via...

DerekB24/11/202108/11/2022

AHSA Monthly Meeting 24 November 2021 (Lance Halvorson: RAAF Strike Aircraft 1953-2010)

Our Melbourne monthly meeting on 24 November 2021, in collaboration with the Friends of Air Force History and Heritage, was held in person at...

1914 The French stunt pilot Maurice Guillaux made the first seaplane flight in Australia, test flying a Farman “hydro-aeroplane” imported into the country by Lebbeus Hordern. Guillaux and his team spent a week assembling Hordern’s seaplane, which had been shipped in four large crates, at a cost of £1600. The aircraft was reassembled in a shed on the beach at Double Bay, “just outside the Victor Motor Works” (a local company manufacturing marine and other small engines). Guillaux exercised an exacting personal supervision of the procedure, so that he was satisfied that everything had been correctly assembled “right to a millimetre”. The test flight of the completed seaplane took place on Friday, May 8, at around 4pm, in front of a crowd of some 200-300 people. The Farman was wheeled to the water’s edge, fuelled, and then Guillaux and an un-named mechanic climbed aboard. The mechanic, in the passenger seat behind the pilot, set the propeller whirring, which blew a cloud of sand into the construction shed and knocked small children among the spectators off their feet! Skimming across the waters of Double Bay, the seaplane rose “like a great bird” into the air, and Guillaux and his passenger set off on a 15-minute flight across the harbour to Mosman, Manly and then back towards the city, before landing in the waters of Double Bay and covering the distance to the shore “with the speed of an express train”. During the flight the plane was saluted by a Manly ferry, sounding its siren as it passed overhead. Source: Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences (Powerhouse Museum) website

1952 PLTOFF W.H. (‘Bill’) Simmonds scored the only fully confirmed RAAF victory over a Communist MiG-15 in the Korean War. He was in a flight of four Meteors of No 77 Squadron protecting US bombers, making the largest single attack of the war so far against an important supply depot at Sunan (now the site of Pyongyang airport), when MiGs attacked from behind. Simmonds was able to get onto the tail of one of the MiGs as it passed less than 10 metres below him and blasted it with a long burst of cannon fire. Two other members of the RAAF flight reported seeing the enemy pilot eject as his aircraft went into a spin and crashed to earth. Australian pilots reported a total of five MiGs shot down during the war, but this was the only occasion where there was absolutely no doubt about the claim. Source: airforce.gov.au