World Aviation in 1918 - Part 2

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13 April
Teniente Luis C. Candelaria of the Argentinean Army makes the first aerial crossing of the Andes. He flies the 120 miles from Zapala, Argentina to Cunço in Chile in a Morane-Saulnier Parasol monoplane, reaching an altitude of 13,000 feet to clear the higher peaks.

14 April
The 94th Aero (Pursuit) squadron becomes the first American unit to engage in combat when Lieutenants Douglas Campbell and Alan Winslow, flying Nieuport 28's shoot down two German aeroplanes and capture the pilots.

21 April
Baron Manfred Von Richthofen, the 'Red Baron', is shot down and killed. Manfred von Richthofen was the most successful fighter pilot of the First World War and at the time of his death, he had shot down 80 Allied aircraft in air combat.

Although Captain Roy Brown of No.209 Squadron is credited with the destruction of von Richthofen's Fokker Triplane, it has also been suggested that the Red Baron actually fell victim to ground fire whilst being pursued by Captain Brown.

29 April
Captain Edward Vernon Rickenbacker, who would later become America's top ace of the First World War, with 26 victories, claims his first victory, an Albatros Scout.

11 May
The American Expeditionary Force receives the first United States built de havilland DH4.

Italian Corpo Aeronautico Militare aircraft are used to fly an air service across the Tyrrhenian Sea, which lasts for a month.

15 May
The United States Army Signal Corp establishes the first American airmail service between New York and Washington, using Curtiss JN and Standard J aircraft.

Captain Rudolph W. Schroeder attains a height of 10,093 metres. (33,113 feet) flying from Dayton, Ohio, in a Packard-Le Père LUSAC-11 fighter, powered by a liberty12 engine, fitted with a Turbocharger.

18 May
The 96th Aero Squadron, the first American bomber unit, forms in France.

19 May
In the latest of a series of monthly raids on London and the Home Counties by German Gotha bombers and Staaken airships, 49 civilians are killed and 179 injured as bombs fell in residential areas before midnight

Hauptmann H Kohl receives the Pour le Mérite for flying 800 missions.

20 May
Overman Act creates the Bureau of Aircraft Production and the Division of Military Aeronautics. The United States Army Air Service is formed from these on 24 May.

24 May
US Army Air Service is formed.

The Chief Directorate of the Workers and Peasants Military Air Fleet (GU-RKKVF: Glavoce Upravlenie-Raboche-Krestyanskogo Vozdushhnogo Flota) replaces the All-Russian Air Board.

29 May
Brigadier General Mason Patrick is made Chief of the US Air Service in France.

31 May
1st Lt Douglas Campbell shoots down his fifth German airplane to become the US Army's first ace.

June
Oberleutnant Ernst Udet receives the Pour le Mérite.

2 June
Oberleutnant Erich Löwenhardt receives the Pour le Mérite

12 June
American aircraft of the 96th Aero Squadron carry out the first bombing raid by US aircraft on the Western Front, attacking the railway yards at Dommany-Baroncourt.

24 June
Fleeing from the Russian Revolution, aircraft designer Igor Sikorsky offers his services to the French Government.

19 June
Italy's most successful fighter pilot, Maggiore Francesco Baracca, credited with 34 victories, is killed during a ground attack mission at Montello.

10 July
Leutnant F. Rumey is awarded the Pour le Mérite.

15 July
General Ludendorff launches the final major attack of the German spring Offensive at Reims. It fails by the 18th.

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