2027 Show Theme: 100th Anniversary of the First Solo Nonstop Transatlantic Flight
🛩️ The First Solo Nonstop Transatlantic Flight
Charles Lindbergh, May 20–21, 1927
In the early morning of 20 May 1927, Charles Lindbergh took off from Roosevelt Field, Mineola, New York, on his successful attempt to fly nonstop from New York to the European continental land mass. Over the next 33.5 hours, Lindbergh and the Spirit of St. Louis encountered many challenges before landing at Le Bourget Airport near Paris, at 10:22 p.m. on 21 May 1927, completing the first solo crossing of the Atlantic.
- Aircraft: Spirit of St. Louis
- Route: New York → Paris
- Duration: 33.5 hours
- Significance: First solo and first New York–Paris nonstop crossing
Other 1st Transatlantic
Flights
🛩️ The First Transatlantic Flight (with stops)
U.S. Navy NC‑4, May 1919 The NC‑4 flying boat became the first aircraft ever to cross the Atlantic Ocean, though not nonstop. It flew from the U.S. to Europe with multiple stops (Newfoundland → Azores → Portugal).
🛩️ The First Nonstop Transatlantic Flight
John Alcock & Arthur Whitten Brown, June 14–15, 1919
This flight also carried 197 letters, making it the first transatlantic airmail.
- Aircraft: Vickers Vimy IV bomber
- Route: St. John’s, Newfoundland → Clifden, Ireland
- Duration: 16 hours, 27 minutes
- Distance: ~1,890 miles
- Conditions: Fog, icing, turbulence; Brown repeatedly climbed onto the wings to clear ice
- Landing: Crash‑landing in Derrygimla Bog, but both survived
- Outcome: Won the Daily Mail ÂŁ10,000 prize and were knighted by King George V
🛩️ The First Transatlantic Flight by a Woman
Amelia Earhart, June 17–18, 1928
- Role: Passenger (with pilots Wilmer Stultz & Louis Gordon)
- Route: Newfoundland → Wales
- Significance: First woman to cross the Atlantic by air
She completed her own solo transatlantic flight in 1932.