Hidrocanoas y hidroflotadores: libros - historia y técnica

Schneider Trophy Aircraft 1913-1931

At the end of 1912, Jacques Schneider announced his intention to present an annual trophy for an international seaplane contest. There were only twelve Schneider contests, but these were major international events, which came to rival others in Britain, Italy, France, and the US.
Biplane seaplanes and flying boats predominated the early contests and some very advanced twin-float biplanes were among the winners as late as 1925. Of all contenders, it was the monoplane which was to become the symbol of the Schneider Trophy, when its Supermarine and Macchi designs reached the apex of seaplane -racing performance.

The final, winning combination of a Supermarine airframe and Rolls-Royce engine made a vital contribution to Britain's defence in 1940, in the form of the Rolls-Royce powered Hurricane and Spitfire.

This book gives a detailed account of the contests; the design, development, and achievements of both aircraft which took part and which failed to; and the advanced ? and sometimes unrealistic ? ideas behind the projects themselves.

An engineering apprenticeship at the Gloster Aircraft Company initiated Derek James' lifetime career in aviation. He went on to join the ATC, Royal Observer Corps, Royal Navy, RAF, SBAC, and Dowty Group, and is the author of 19 aviation books.

The Pan Am Clipper : The History of Pan American's Flying Boats 1935-1945

Covers one of aviation history's most inspiring and magical periods. One of the most romantic planes ever built, flying in a Clipper was intended to rival a great ocean liner.
Illustrated with more than 100 archive photographs, this impressive book is a tribute to a technical wonder that continues to fascinate many people today.

Fabulous Flying Boats - A History of the World's Passenger Flying Boats

The history of the development and operations of flying boats in the early twentieth century is a vibrant one, full of colourful characters and experimentation. In 'Fabulous Flying Boats', Leslie Dawson captures this spirit of dynamism, reminding us of the most successful early pioneers of the seaplanes development, including a little known and oft-overlooked rival to the Wright Brothers, working to put their mutual successes in context.

He goes on to describe, in clear and vivid detail, and using first hand-accounts, what it was like to be aboard one of the resulting huge passenger flying boats, as air crew and as a passenger. He also recounts the part played by the military boats inevitably seconded to such use.

Incredibly well researched, the narrative embraces the globe-trotting air routes, from Europe to the Far East and to the Americas, and is well supported with evocative images from private and corporate collections, and the worlds aviation museums. The in-depth Appendix is virtually a book in itself.

Flying Boats : Air Travel in the Golden Age

"Flying Boats: Air Travel in the Golden Age" sets out to do justice to a time of glamorous, unhurried air travel, unrecognisable to most of today's air travellers, but sorely missed by some.
During the 1930s, long-distance air travel was the preserve of the flying boat, which transported well-heeled passengers in ocean-liner style and comfort across the oceans.

But then the Second World War came, and things changed. Suddenly, landplanes were more efficient, and in abundance: long concrete runways had been constructed during the war that could be used by a new generation of large transport aircraft; and endless developments in aircraft meant they could fly faster and for further distances.
Commercial flying boat services resumed, but their days would be numbered.

High Hulls : Flying Boats of the 1930s and 1940s

For a time, the flying boat was seen as the way of the future. These aircraft, so strange and foreign to the modern mind, once criss-crossed the world and fulfilled essential military roles. In his latest book for Fonthill, Charles Bain looks at the golden age of the flying boat, when these sometimes strange and often beautiful vessels spanned the globe.
These vessels - a combination of ship and airplane - found themselves working as patrol aircraft, passenger aircraft, transports, and even as combat aircraft.

This volume contains their stories, from memorable aircraft such as the Short Sunderland and Boeing 314 Clipper, to the craft that roamed the Pacific Theatre of the Second World War, to forgotten giants from Saunders-Roe and even strange jet fighters that once landed like ducks. It even includes the flying boat that has not let time get in the way of doing its job - the Martin Mars.

Each of these aircraft has a story worthy of the telling, and often a memorable role to play in the history of aviation. 'High Hulls' delves deeply into a long-vanished part of aviation's golden age.

Faszination Wasserflugzeuge

Wasserflugzeuge verströmen eine urtümliche Faszination, denn mit ihnen kommt man an Orte, die meist einsam, abgelegen, entsprechend unberührt und schön sind. Orte, an die sich der normale Pauschaltourist kaum hinverirrt. Und so haftet den vielseitigen Wasserflugzeugen der Nimbus des klassischen Buschflugzeugs an, das man in Gegenden wie Kanada, Alaska und der Karibik findet. Und vermehrt auch bei uns in Europa.

Ingo Bauernfeind beschreibt in seinem Buch die einzelnen Flugzeugtypen und ihre Einsatzgebiete, untermalt mit wunderschönen Aufnahmen, die Lust machen, sofort auf Floats in eine Blockhütte nach Kanada aufzubrechen.

Jet Flying Boats

During the Second World War, more than 9,000 flying boats were produced by the main protagonists, fulfilling a multitude of roles including maritime reconnaissance, bombing, fleet spotting, search and rescue, long-range transport and communications. However, time was running out, and a little over a decade after the end of the war, the military flying boat would appear to be a dying breed on the verge of extinction.

It would be another twenty years before a new breed of multi-engine flying boats would leave the drawing boards of leading aerospace companies to successfully fulfil, not only their traditional military roles of maritime reconnaissance and search and rescue, but one at which they have proved to be very adept, that of aerial fire-fighting.

Currently the twin-turboprop powered twelve-seat Dornier Seastar amphibian is being built in China, which is also developing the AG600 search and rescue amphibian for the Chinese Navy.
There have been a number of successful turboprop conversion of piston-engine flying boats such as the Grumman Mallard and Canadair CL-215 amphibians.

In this book, aviation historian David Oliver covers the little-known flying-boat legacy of the Second World War, which includes jet fighter flying boat projects; the jet maritime reconnaissance flying boat development in the Cold War; the successes and failures of turbo-prop flying boats; converted turbo-prop flying boats; as well as the new horizons for flying boats in the twenty-first century.

Ailes de feu - les pompiers du ciel

En France, au début des années 1960, un homme prend conscience que si rien n'est entrepris pour enrayer le fléau du feu, toutes les surfaces boisées du sud de notre pays risquent de partir en fumée. Cet homme, Francis Arrighi, va se battre pour convaincre les plus hautes autorités de mettre en place des moyens aériens de lutte contre les feux de forêts. La création de la Base Avions de Marignane remonte au 24 juin 1963, avec l'affectation des deux premiers hydravions bombardiers d'eau Catalina...

Depuis cette date, les "Pélicans" - code radio adopté par les bombardiers d'eau -, étendent leurs ailes jaune et rouge feu sur les garrigues de Provence et le maquis Corse. Au fil des ans, la flotte de la Sécurité Civile s'est développée, diversifiée aussi, incluant de nouveaux avions, testant de nouveaux concepts, de nouvelles armes...
Et d'armement, il en est bien question, dans cette guerre qui, au retour des beaux jours, est déclarée inlassablement, innée après année.

Grâce au travail fourni depuis plus de vingt ans par Alain Ernoult, nous découvrons l'action des équipages "sur feu", les images sans doute les plus spectaculaires réalisées à ce jour sur le sujet. On y retrouve, à travers "l'oeil Ernoult", à la fois les machines, les hommes, l'action, le feu et... le danger, qui est omniprésent. Le risque inhérent aux conditions exceptionnelles de ces prises de vues transparaît et transcende l'image que véhiculent ces hommes hors du commun.