Wright "Flyers," Replicas, and Reproductions: A Reign of Dangerous and Deadly

Fort Meyer, 1908. Orville trying to regain control of the Wright "Flyer" as it plummets to the earth.
Lt. Thomas Selfridge, his passenger, was the first fatality from a powered flyer .

Moment of impact--Ohio, 2009. The crash of a Wright "Flyer" replica that critically injured pilot Mark Dusenberry.


Looking at the Wright "Flyers,"  Then and Now

"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again 
and expecting different results"--attributed to Albert Einstein

Even up to the present day, Wright "Flyers" have proven both dangerous and deadly.* As recently as 2011, the crash of a Wright "Flyer" replica tragically killed two pilots, Don Gum and Mitchell Carey. This incident is a continuation of Wright "Flyer" accidents that began years before the Wrights went public with the "Flyers" they built in 1908. Trying to fly a  "replica" of a Wright "Flyer" has proven hazardous--and sometimes fatal, even with modern modifications. Click on video link below.

       

In 2009, a crash of a Wright flyer replica critically injured pilot Mark Dusenberry, second photo, above, and photos below. Two years before that in 2007, Dusenberry crashed but, fortunately, escaped injury.

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(At right) A view of the 2009 crash scene of Mark Dusenberry of Ohio.
(U.S. Air Force photo/Al Bright)

(Below) "Air Force crash rescue and safety personnel inspect the wreckage of the replica of the 1905 Wright flyer III that crashed Oct. 1, 2009, on Huffman Prairie flying Field at Wright-Patterson

Air Force Base, Ohio. Pilot and vintage aircraft Builder Mark Dusenberry of

Dennison, Ohio, was injured during the practice flight in preparation to

celebrate the 104th anniversary of Practical flight." ( U. S.Air Force photo/Ted Theopolos)

A Flawed Design.

Was the Original "Flyer" Even Capable of

Sustained Free Flight ?

“The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.” 

                      ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

Tests by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) have proven that a close replica of what is believed to be the first Wright flyer is virtually impossible to fly.

"I thoroughly cannot imagine the Wright brothers, having very little experience in powered aircraft, getting this airborne and flying," said Major Mike Jansen, an Air Force test pilot. 

 Before the 2003 "Centennial of Flight" in the United States, there were a number of groups besides the AIAA building "replicas" of the Wright Flyer I (called the "First Flyer").

                   

"[Nick Engler] and his ['Wright Experience'] group took [their] plane out to a large field near the Dayton airport. They put out a guide rail for takeoff, just as the Wrights did. They checked the wings and the controls, started up the engine, ran with the plane as the propellers pushed it forward, and got less than a foot into the air, for about a second, on the first try

 Engler said he was thrilled. And by the next day, the plane got airborne for about four seconds."

But all the early Wright "Flyers," not just the Wright "Flyer" I, had problems. They had difficulty taking off, and if they were launched, staying in the air. They tended to stall, were incredibly unstable, and together with the instability, difficult to control. The Wrights themselves documented  problems with their "Flyers"--and made many attempts to correct them.

Attempts to Fix the Wright "Flyers"

The Wrights claimed to document the first modifications of the original Wright Flyer in 1904 with the construction of their second machine, the Wright "Flyer" II. But there were serious problems even after the modifications. With their limited knowledge at the time, they were clearly working in the dark. The changes were mostly trial and error guesswork, not scientific as Wright historians liked to claim.  Due to the instability of the plane, they piled  70 pounds of iron bars on the front of the plane. They, of course, increased the hp of the engine.  There were other modifications , including, unbelievably,  a reduction of the camber (curvature) of the wings. As for their historians' claims of their control and understanding of coordinated turns, they very often couldn't stop the plane from turning.** In May of 1904, thinking, we guess, they finally had a flyable plane, they invited reporters and even their father, Bishop Wright,  to watch them demonstrate the new "flyer" at Huffman's Prairie in Dayton, Ohio. They failed miserably.

They continued trying to launch in 1904 until it became  apparent they needed to build a catapult. The plane wasn't capable of taking off without the assistance of the strong, steady winds that they had at Kitty Hawk. It is claimed in some journal entries that they did manage a few take offs from level ground, but it seems doubtful.

Their problems continued into the 1905 season with their new, "improved Wright flyer III." But July 14, 1905, with Orville at the controls, the 1905 "Flyer" suffered a terrible crash, destroying large parts of the "Flyer." After the crash, the Wrights made  more modifications, including  increasing the size of the rudders, until the end of their flying season in 1905.  Historians have claimed they had essentially fixed their problems and had now developed the "first practical flyer." They didn't fly again until the spring of 1908 after a trek from Ohio  to Kill Devil Hills where they had the assistance of the winds and the hill. They had some successes and took up a passenger, Charlie Furnas. But Wilbur crashed again within a short time, demolishing the plane and sustaining injuries.

Going Public

Even so, after their years of secrecy, the Wrights went public in August, 1908.  It would appear that the successes of the AEA and flyers in Europe were driving them to reveal their goods before they'd really worked out the kinks.

It wasn't long before the first fatality occurred. Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge of the AEA (Alexander Graham Bell's Aerial Experiment Association) became the first death from a powered airplane crash--a Wright "Flyer" piloted by Orville. Selfridge had been ordered by the military or volunteered (we don't know which)  to fly as a passenger in 1908 at Ft. Myer, Virginia. Orville survived the crash, but was severely injured.

 

Lt. Thomas Selfridge, West Point graduate,
1882-1908, First flying fatality.

 

The aftermath of the crash of the Wright flyer that killed Lieutenant Selfridge in 1908. This was the first known fatal accident of a  powered airplane in the world. Orville, as pilot, suffered severe injuries.

The wreck of the Wright flyer in 1910 that killed Charles Rolls of the
 Rolls Royce company. 
.

The "Vin Fiz" (below), 1911 There were so many parts replaced repairing this Wright "Flyer" in its attempt to fly across the U. S. that it's joked that only a few pieces of the original plane reached the West Coast. The pilot sustained many injuries and wasn't able to meet the deadline of the competition.

One of the dozen crashes of the "Vin Fiz," the first plane that Wrights historians claim
flew across the United States.

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 Revising the Wright "Flyers" "and "Rigging" History


 All [the] ants in the grass lowered their heads for the "Flyer"(sic) passage..."--comment by rrmola on youtube about Wright flyer replica tests

With the aid of Caltech wind tunnel tests, Professor Emeritus Fred Culick of the AIAA, states that he has been able to spot areas where the flyer design was flawed. Culick has proposed using the tests to make targeted modifications to their full size "Flyer" I design, in order to make it a safer, powered airplane. The AIAA plans to use their plane to demonstrate flights of their "replica" and to educate the public. The modifications will be designed to be difficult to spot.
 

"Members of the AIAA group said their effort balances authenticity with safety. 'We want the experience, but we don't want to kill ourselves,' said Cherne, who worked on the Apollo moon missions."

Isn't this essentially what pro-Wrights accuse Glenn Curtiss and Dr. Zahm of doing in 1914 to prove the 1903 Langley Aerodrome was capable of flight? Secretly making modifications? Indeed, Orville Wright asserted that Curtiss and the Smithsonian secretly made modern modifications to the original Langley plane to make it fly in 1914 when it was incapable of flight in 1903. He even made a list of the changes. The accusations were, of course, denied by the Smithsonian at the time.  First of all, modifications to the plane were not secret. Changes had to be made to adjust the balance, trussing, etc., of the plane because they had attached pontoons to launch it from Lake Keuka in New York. They also cut some corners, not to assist the Langley plane to fly, but to save money because the rebuild was underfunded. Obviously, they had to shore up the wings, because the old plane was not built to support the extra weight and drag of the pontoons and pilot.

It's troubling that despite strong evidence the Wright "Flyer" I wasn't even capable of flying precisely as the Wrights claimed in 1903, i.e., four sustained, controlled flights from level ground with only the assistance of a 12 horsepower engine, the AIAA plans to educate the public that it did indeed fly  in 1903, just as the Wrights stated. 

Statements of witnesses, including the Wrights themselves strongly indicate that it didn't and couldn't. Wright  proponents, with all of their efforts, certainly haven't proven that it did. If it didn't, shouldn't we accuse the Wright proponents of committing fraud if they continue with these plans?  How can they display their modified version of the "Flyer" I, designed to fool the public into believing it's a copy of the original? Shouldn't the demonstrations be preceded by a disclosure that this plane may not have been capable of flight exactly as the Wrights claimed? Shouldn't the AIAA educate the public that it has made modifications so that the plane will reliably fly now and so that the pilot won't be risking his life?

Undying Faith in the "Word" of the Wrights

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.”― Carl Sagan

 Strangely, with all of these problems, none of the pilots and builders of the Wright replicas, including aeronautical engineers, seem to have questioned whether the Wrights actually achieved powered, sustained flight as early as 1903, or whether they flew at any time exactly and as successfully as they claimed before 1908. ( In 1908 the Wrights flew publicly, but prior to that, we only have murky reports by friends and family plus documentation concocted by the Wrights of their own claims.) It's a fair question, since, as stated, with present day aeronautical expertise, years of work, and the spending of megabucks, the replica builders of the 1903 flyer haven't been able to duplicate what the Wrights claimed they did on December 17, 1903. What's more, the Wrights claimed they spent only a thousand dollars  (an earlier report stated 5,000, but  Orville Wright later denied that report), glided for only a few seasons, and spent only two months testing some airfoil shapes in a relatively crude wind tunnel. Of course, it's only fair that we translate the money they said they spent into today's dollars. But still, there's no comparison.

It's no wonder the modern day Wright builders attribute to the Wrights a genius beyond compare in all of history (or so I suppose). They did the apparently impossible, a feat that science is, therefore, unable to replicate.

"The more we have done trying to reproduce that (the four claimed flights), the more enthralled we were with their amazing capability," said Jack Cherne. He heads a Los Angeles team of volunteers from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics that's spent more than 20 years trying to build an airworthy Wright Flyer. "They were just geniuses."

 But they also attribute the Wrights' claimed "success" to a moment in time which would be nearly impossible to replicate--a particular temperature, altitude, humidity, and wind speed that fabled day of December 17. Some add the Wrights had achieved a marvelous expertise at flying by practicing from the hill in their gliders. Beyond difficult to replicate--but still, science needs to replicate a claim to prove it is true. Looking at the odds, it becomes nearly laughable.

Finally, with no other explanations, some attribute the Wrights' first "flights" to divine intervention. There is no doubt you can choose what you want to believe. After all, America has freedom of religion! But  facts, reason, science, and logic are probably far better ideas when we're discussing safe, successful powered flight.

All of these excuses for the Wright Flyers indicate that Wright fans have accepted the Wrights' claims with absolutely unqualified belief. It's a case of "walking on water," possible only to angels and divinity, but accepted by historians, "scientists," and engineers. A miracle indeed.

Introducing the Elephant in the Room

Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored."--Aldous Huxley

In 2003 Ken Hyde's  group, the  'Wright Experience," won the competition to demonstrate their replica version of the 1903 Wright "flyer" at Kitty Hawk for the celebration.of the Centennial of Flight. Watch the video in the link below to see what happened (or more correctly, what didn't happen).

Though we sympathize with the "Wright Experience" Group, they should now sympathize with Professor Langley, whose very public failure in 1903 was on the launch pad of his Aerodrome--before it even had a chance to lift into the air and prove its worth.

 Hyde's group built their plane, above, as close as they felt possible to the original, from what they could deduce studying photographs and documents. Some claim that Hyde's plane is an exact replica, but the Wrights left no plans or exact specifications. We would have to accept some of the photographs as the Wright "Flyer" I, even if we have little proof beyond the Wrights' statements that all of these photos are genuine and correctly dated. Further, it's accepted that after their last claimed flight December 17, the wind smashed the original plane to pieces.

The plane hanging at the Smithsonian that is vaunted as the original was built, according to Orville,  from the rescued scraps of the 1903 plane, which he (not Wilbur) said they packed up and shipped home to Dayton. See "Where on Earth is the Real Wright 'Flyer'"? on this Blog. Since "reconstructions" were supervised and completed by Orville from memory, it is only an assumption that the Smithsonian plane is correct. Except for Ken Hyde's replica, most replicas are apparently made from measurements taken from the Smithsonian plane. It's a big assumption that these measurements are the same as the original, and admissions are being made that they may be off.

So is there a design of the original Wright "Flyer" I that really was capable of flight from level ground, a marvelous plane, like the "lost chord," that we will never be able to replicate because we can't find it, but we will have to trust in the Wrights' claims that it really, in fact, existed? The search, to repeat, has come up empty, so far, despite numerous attempts, computers, modern science, and expenditures of seven figure dollar amounts.

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* It will be argued by Wright advocates that all of the early planes were dangerous and that many pioneer pilots were killed trying to fly them. However, it was the Wright "Flyers" that came to be known as "killers."

**In 1904 with Chanute observing , the Flyer II was catapulted into the air and managed to remain up for a total of 23and 4/5 seconds. Out of control (the pilot couldn't stop it from turning), it crashed, suffering a week's worth of repairs. Please see "The Wrights Invented What?  Lateral Control and John J. Montgomery." for Wilbur's diary notes and Chanute's report. This is the report on which historians base their assertion that Chanute saw the Wrights fly. 

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Please see an interesting discussion of terminology, such as replication, reproduction, renovation, reconstruction, and restoration