The Dream of Flying: How Airplanes Came to Be

Aviation is booming, but how did it come to be?
Loukia Papadopoulos

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Aviation has been steadily increasing since the creation of commercial airplanes. On 24 July 2019, Flightradar24 recorded over 225,000 flights including helicopters, private jets, and personal aircraft. It was the busiest day in aviation ever.

But how did it all begin? The dream of flying has been in the hearts of men from the earliest times. In ancient Greece, there was the tale of Icarus. Icarus was the son of the master craftsman Daedalus.

Icarus and his father decided to leave Crete by flying with wings made by feather and wax. His father warned him not to fly too close to the Sun so his wings don't melt. But Icarus was ambitious. 

He flew way up high and the Sun melted his wings. He crashed into the ocean and drowned. Although the story is more about the dangers of hubris, it does show that men dreamt of flying from the earliest days. 

So when did men manage to finally fly for real? The story is a long and complex one beginning with the creation of hydrogen balloons to the Wright brothers' first airplane.

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