History

On 16 May 1943, nineteen Lancaster aircraft from the RAF's 617 Squadron set off to attack the great dams in the industrial heart of Germany. Flying at a height of 60ft, they dropped a series of bombs which bounced across the water and destroyed two of...

Founded in 1916 by William E. Boeing, a wealthy timber merchant, the mighty Boeing Company's long history spans decades of rich achievement and technological development. Beginning with the manufacture of seaplanes, fighters and, from the 1930s onwards,...

Discover the enthralling story of the HMS Queen Elizabeth, the Royal Navy's largest ever aircraft carrier and SUBJECT OF THE MAJOR NEW BBC DOCUMENTARY SERIES THE WARSHIP'Fascinating, often funny and sometimes moving . . . Terrill takes us deep into the...

A celebratory look back at one hundred years of passenger flight, featuring full-colour reproductions of route maps and posters from the world's most iconic airlinesFrom the first faltering flights over plains, water, and mountains to the vast networks...

On January 15, 2009, the world witnessed one of the most remarkable emergency landings in aviation history when Captain Chesley Sully Sullenberger skillfully glided US Airways Flight 1549 onto the surface of the Hudson River, saving the lives of all 155...

Using specially commissioned artwork and detailing technical specifications, this book explores the Bf 109's different roles occasioned by wartime necessity, from its employment as a fighter to its evolution as a fighter-bomber. One of the principal...

Even before the spectacular success of its X-1 rocket-powered aircraft in breaking the 'sound barrier', the adventurous Bell Aircraft Corporation was already pushing ahead with a parallel project to build a second aircraft capable of far higher speeds...

The Douglas Devastator was the US Navy's first all-metal combat aircraft, the Navy's first airplane with a fully enclosed cockpit, the first aircraft to have hydraulically folding wings, and the first US Navy torpedo bomber to see combat. Although facing...

The United States built the best strategic bombers of World War II, and by the end of the conflict America’s bombers dominated the skies in both Europe and the Pacific. American Bomber Aircraft of World War II is a detailed guide to all the bombers...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781940948270Author Embry RuckerFormat PaperbackPage Count 250Imprint Transreal BooksPublisher Transreal BooksWeight(grams) 263gDimensions(mm) 203mm * 133mm...

Of the many futuristic military aircraft concepts created in the 1950s the North American XB-70 still stands out as the most awe-inspiring. With its huge, white partially-folding delta wing, its fuselage resembling a striking cobra and its extraordinary...

Was Keith Harris's Orville really named after the first-ever flyer? What exactly is a 'Spitfire'? Why did Richard Branson try to cross the Atlantic in a balloon when he owned an airline? These are the questions that fail to keep proper aeronautical...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781945441035Author Bill HammackFormat PaperbackPage Count 304Imprint Articulate Noise BooksPublisher Articulate Noise Books

A compelling and fascinating account of aerial combat in World War I, revealing the terrible risks run by the men who fought and died in the world's first air war. Little more than ten years after the first powered flight, aircraft were pressed into...

Laika began her life as a stray dog on the streets of Moscow and died in 1957 aboard the Soviet satellite Sputnik II. Initially the USSR reported that Laika, the first animal to orbit the earth, had survived in space for seven days, providing valuable...

'A soaring gift of a book' Owen Sheers'Remarkable' Mark Vanhoenacker, author of Skyfaring'Stunning . . . a love letter to nature' Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of LoveThe day she flew in a glider for the first time, Rebecca Loncraine fell in...

Just eighteen months after two Frenchmen made the world's first ever flight, a fearless British woman hopped into a flimsy balloon and flew across the London sky for nearly an hour. Since then, many other remarkable British women have decided to defy...

During the First World War, Italy was on the side of their British Allies and their fight was against the Austro-Hungarian Empire, bordering on Austria. In October 1917, the Austro-Hungarians managed to push the Italians back during the battle of...

More than forty years after its cancellation, the BAC TSR2 is still a controversial aircraft. Years ahead of its time, it was abruptly cancelled by a new government when flight testing had ony just begun. Built to a demanding RAF requirement , the BAC...

The SR-71 Blackbird is an iconic aircraft that has come to symbolize America's technological superiority during the Cold War. Using recently declassified information, globally renowned expert Paul Crickmore updates his definitive account of the aircraft...

The story of the strange mixture of romanticism, militarism and technology that has made planes so important to England, from the brilliant author of Britain's War MachineThe history of England and the aeroplane is one tangled with myths - of 'the Few'...

Illustrated with detailed artworks of Japanese aircraft and their markings, Japanese Aircraft of World War II is a detailed guide to all the aircraft deployed by the Japanese military from the Second Sino-Japanese War to the surrender in the Pacific in...

Published to coincide with the 80th birthday of the Spitfire this is a gripping and visually spectacular volume, which celebrates the life of Britain's most iconic military aircraft. The Spitfire turns 80 on 5 March 2016, and the passion for the...

To the fifteen passengers and crew onboard the lumbering Short Sunderland flying boat, everything appeared normal and routine as it lifted off from the seaplane base at RAF Invergordon on Sunday, 25 August 1942. Its destination was Iceland, where one of...

During the Second World War, RAF Lancaster bombers took the conflict into the very heart of Hitler's Third Reich, and flew some of the most daring operations of the war. Surprisingly, of the 7,377 Lancasters built only two survive today, one in Britain...

Before World War II, Brooklands was the most famous motor racing venue in the world, attracting large and glamorous crowds to its banked circuit to watch races being won and records being broken. Also an important centre for aviation, Brooklands saw the...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.AwardsWinner of ALA Notable Books (Nonfiction) 2016.Book InformationISBN 9781476728742Author David McCulloughFormat HardbackPage Count 336Imprint Simon & SchusterPublisher Simon...

By some margin the most successful British medium-range airliner ever produced, the world-beating Viscount was a sublime combination of Vickers' state-of-the-art postwar design and Rolls-Royce's cutting-edge power-plant technology, both companies being...

Following the life of this aircraft from its initial inception to the delivery of the first production models, this book begins with Boeing's initial thoughts concerning a new wide-body transport, how the original concept changes over a period of months...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781908476876Author Hans-Ulrich RudelFormat PaperbackPage Count 282Imprint Black House PublishingPublisher Black House PublishingWeight(grams) 358g

The revolutionary X-15 remains the fastest manned aircraft ever to fly. Built in the two decades following World War II, it was the most successful of the high-speed X-planes. The only recently broken 'sound barrier' was smashed completely by the X-15,...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781857803495Author Jonathan FalconerFormat HardbackPage Count 320Imprint Midland PublishingPublisher Crecy Publishing

In Concorde, Jonathan Glancey tells the story of this magnificent and hugely popular aircraft anew, taking the reader from the moment Captain Chuck Yeager first broke the sound barrier in 1947 through to the last commercial flight of the supersonic...

The B-24 Liberator remains to this day the world's most produced heavy bomber and multi-engine aircraft, and the most-produced military aircraft in US history, with almost 19,000 examples leaving the assembly lines of five plants. Through a broad range...

Gatwick's very first jetliner touched down on 16 November 1958, and over the next fifty years the airport grew to become Britain's second busiest airport, as well as the busiest single-runway airport in the world.Classic Gatwick Jetliners is the...

The story of one of greatest technological achievements of the 20th century told from a pilot's-eye view, which will appeal to all enthusiasts of modern aviation. From her first commercial flight in 1976, and throughout 27 years of service, Concorde...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780615214726Author Ed DoverFormat PaperbackPage Count 182Imprint Ed DoverPublisher Ed DoverWeight(grams) 249gDimensions(mm) 229mm * 152mm * 10mm

'A stone cold classic. One of the best military aviaton memoirs ever written' Rowland White, author of Vulcan 607 'I only have to think Speed, and I am at 600 knots in seconds. Think Height and I am gazing down from a eight-mile-high perch within one...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781560987253Author Doris L. RichFormat PaperbackPage Count 336Imprint Smithsonian BooksPublisher Smithsonian BooksWeight(grams) 1g

Although airports are now best known for interminable waits at check-in counters, liquid restrictions for carry-on luggage, and humiliating shoe-removal rituals at security, they were once the backdrops for jet-setters who strutted, martinis in hand,...