It was a blustery day in June of 1919 when pilot John Alcock and navigator Arthur Brown set off in their Vickers Vimy aircraft. They were departing Newfoundland on a daring quest – to make the world’s first non-stop trans-Atlantic flight. Their incentive, a 10,000 British pound prize offered by the London Daily Mail newspaper.
Their Vickers Vimy plane was a modified World War I bomber with a 67-foot wingspan. It had been outfitted with extra fuel tanks to make the Atlantic crossing possible.
The flight got off to a rough start. The heavily laden plane nearly missed a stone wall at the end of the runway during takeoff. Once up in the air, the flight was plagued with instrument problems and terrible weather. At one point, the plane stalled then plummeted from 4,000 feet towards the sea through clouded skies and fog banks. Alcock was able to recover the spiraling plane at just 100 feet above the surface of the churning Atlantic.
The Vickers Vimy landed in an Irish bog near Clifden, on Ireland’s west coast. Alcock and Brown were heralded as heroes. The flight had taken sixteen hours and twelve minutes.
Learn more in the Lester David papers at UW’s American Heritage Center.