March 29 in aviation: the first flight of the Tupolev Tu-124 and the last flight with a Vickers VC10 aircraft.
On March 29, 1936, the first flight of the Vought V-141 took place. Vought V-141 (which was later redesigned and renamed V-143) was a prototype single-seat American fighter jet built in the 1930s. It was a development of the failed design of Northrop 3-A, another failure, being rejected by the United States Army Air Corps. The only prototype was sold to the Japanese army in 1937, but no production followed, the type proving inferior to existing Japanese fighters.
Other aviation events on March 29.
The first flight of Tupolev Tu-124.
On March 29, 1960, the first flight of the Tupolev Tu-124 took place. The Tupolev Tu-124 (with the reported NATO name: Cookpot) was a 56-seat short-range twin-jet fighter built in the Soviet Union. It was the first Soviet aircraft powered by turbofan engines.
Astronaut William Oefelein was born.
On March 29, 1965, William Oefelein, an American astronaut, was born. William Anthony "Bill" Oefelein was an American spacecraft officer and former NASA astronaut, known for being one of the pilots of the STS-116 space shuttle mission.
Quebec Air Flight 255 crashed after an explosion.
On March 29, 1979, Quebec Air Flight 255, a Fairchild F-27 (CF-QBL), crashed after an engine explosion, killing 17 of the 24 people on board the aircraft. The plane had taken off from Quebec, destined for the city of Montreal.
British Airways made the last flight with the Vickers VC10.
On March 29, 1981, British Airways made the last flight with a Vickers VC10 aircraft. The Vickers VC10 was a medium-sized, narrow-body, British long-haul aircraft designed and built by Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd and which first flew to Brooklands, Surrey, in 1962. The airliner it was designed to operate over long distances, on the shorter runways of the era and performed excellently for operations at African airports.
The VC10 aircraft held the world record for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic by a 5-hour, 1-minute subsonic aircraft, a record that was held for 41 years, until February 2020 when a British Airways-owned aircraft, a Boeing 747 , broke the record in 4 hours 56 minutes due to storm Ciara. Just the supersonic Concord it was faster.
The first flight of Ilyushin Il-114.
On March 29, 1990, the first flight of the Ilyushin Il-114 took place. The Ilyushin Il-114 is a Russian turboprop aircraft designed for local routes. Destined to replace Antonov An-24, it first flew in 1990. A total of 20 Il-114s were built.
Production of the Il-114 was temporarily suspended in July 2012, with the sixth and last aircraft delivered to Uzbekistan Airlines on May 24, 2013. In 2016, the company said production would resume with all-Russian parts. After the resumption of production, the first flight was made in 2019, and the first aircraft to enter commercial service was in 2021. The decision to end production was in line with the Uzbek government's decision to transform the Tashkent plant, despite Russia's interest in maintain the production line and the existing demand for the aircraft. Production resumed in 2020.