Replica Flyer Foiled By Weather

An anonymous reader submits: "A replica of the Wright Brothers' 1903 flyer failed to fly yesterday afternoon at a demonstration in Chicago. Organizers blamed the measly 5 MPH winds. Kitty Hawk had 25 MPH back on December 17, 1903. IIRC, isn't Chicago the 'Windy City?'" Here's an earlier story about the various groups attempting to re-enact the Wright brothers' pioneer flight.

Re:Trouble for the Wrights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Should we continue to give the Wrights credit for the first powered flight when they had to rely on 25mph winds? Seems the 1903 Wright flyer was more like a glider.

In case you were confused, they were flying into the wind. The reason planes go so fast is so they can create an artifical nose wind and thus give themselves the needed lift. The Wright Brothers weren't just gliding along - they used the strong head winds just like modern planes do. Aircraft carriers that need to boost nose wind for the F16s do the exact same thing.

Re:Trouble for the Wrights?

[YouHaveSnail]

I wasn't confused. But gliders also fly into the wind, using gravity to provide some forward thrust.

My point was that if the tiny engine can't provide enough thrust to generate the lift needed to lift the plain, then the plane was doing more gliding the flying. It's no coincidence that hang gliding is a hugely popular sport in Kittyhawk.

I thought that the reason planes go so fast is that we prefer get from NY to LA in 5 hours instead of 50.

Posters should read the articles they post...

[Knightmare]

Dear anonymous poster, if you had read the article you would realize they blame the wind NOT being strong ENOUGH... Yes Kitty Hawk had 25 MPH winds thats probably why it did fly.

*sigh*

Re:Give'm a break

[Animats]

The Wright Brothers' big contribution was stability and control. Everybody else had been focusing on lift and power, with the result that there were quite a few machines before (and after) the Wright Brothers that could get off the ground, but were incapable of stable flight.

There's a great movie "Gizmos", which has dozens of film sequences of early flight failures. But the best is at the end, when, in a grainy black and white clip, someone with a wing strapped to their back runs down a hill and leaps over a cliff - and flies perfectly. The scene changes to high-resolution color and you see the hang glider flying around for quite a while, and finally touching down softly.