CHUYẾN BAY ĐẦU TIÊN TRONG LỊCH SỬ NH N LOẠI. Từ xa xưa, con người đã mơ ước bay được như các loài chim và khát vọng này luôn ám ảnh họ. Ước mơ bay được bay lên bầu trời, từng bị loài người xem là ước mơ xa xôi, hoang đường, nhưng cũng không thiếu những con người luôn nhiệt huyết khám phá những điều bí ẩn và tin vào sức mạnh của sự chinh phục.
The first flight in the history of mankind.
Since ancient times, humans have dreamed of flying like birds and this desire has always haunted them.
The dream of flying to the sky used to be seen by people as a faraway, desolate dream,
but there are also people who are always eager to discover the mysteries and believe in the power of conquest.
The Rai brothers are such people, examples of exemplary efforts to become great.
They are also great examples of the concept of design thinking, the use of intelligence,
from there to invent the first aircraft that we all know today by the name of aircraft.
Family, toys and inspiration
The Rai brothers are two American brothers, Orvin Rai and Wilbur Rai,
born in a family of five siblings in Dayton, Ohio, USA.
Rai's mother died early, but the two Rai brothers along with other family members
received full and loving education from their father, General Minton Rai.
He is the one who always encourages, supports and persists in following Wilbur and Orvin's quest for conquest.
Mr. Minton always encourages children to develop their curiosity
and urges them to read anything they want from the two huge libraries in the house.
As a library, Mr. Minton has a large library of religious-themed books.
The remaining library is full of books with various genres from literature,
poetry to scientific and mathematical topics.
Their mother, Mrs. Susan, went to college.
It was a completely unusual thing for young women in the 19th century.
The boys may have been inspired by their mother's projects.
A woman with a deep talent for machinery right from when she was a little girl
and spent a lot of time with her father at his horse-drawn carriage shop.
She learned about tools and how to use them.
As a wife and a mother,
she designed and created simple tools for herself
as well as favorite toys for children, including snowmobiles.
Later, she died of tuberculosis when the two brothers were in their 20s.
On a fall afternoon in 1878,
Mr. Minton Rai brought the boys a small wooden toy.
Instead of giving it to the children right away,
Mr. Minton dropped this toy in a room, making it fly up and down the floor.
It looked quite like a helicopter.
This toy has a fan and works thanks to a rubber band.
Designed by a Frenchman named Alphonse Benoist,
this toy can fly in the air for a few seconds after winding the rubber band and releasing it.
This toy was so inspiring that he loved flying for Wilbur, 11, and Orville, 7.
Not only did he like to play with a strange plane,
the two boys even managed to create a star-shaped version of this toy plane.
Not in a hurry and start a business.
The two brothers of Rai show different personalities,
but extremely harmonious, supporting each other when working together.
While Wilbur is a quiet, calm person, has principles,
especially likes to read, write,
Orville is an active person and loves machines.
Both of them went to middle school and did not get a diploma.
The reason is that Wilbur missed the wedding because his family moved.
And Orville had his first idea in business and started his own printing shop,
so he stopped studying at middle school.
Orville adopted his brother to the position of editor for his newspaper,
The West Side News,
and they opened a printing business called Rai and Rai Job Printer
right in their hometown of Dayton in 1889.
However, right after that,
their hobby turned into a bicycle chain that was spreading all over the country.
Within 3 years, the two brothers bought many bicycles,
delivered the daily activities of the printing factory to reliable employees,
and opened a bicycle company called Rai Cycle Company.
They not only repair and rent bicycles but also develop their own brand.
They create many types of bicycles,
among which Van Cleef is the most luxurious type.
The selling price of this one is up to $ 65,
equivalent to a normal worker's salary.
They also make the ST-Claire bicycle cheaper.
Today, the Rai Cycle Company only has 5 types of vehicles manufactured by the main factory.
Fly to the sky!
The hard work from early morning to late at night makes the Rai brothers forget their passion for airplanes.
Until the summer of 1896,
after hearing about Otto Lilienthal,
a German aviation pioneer,
the Rai brothers began serious research on airplanes,
at that time Wilbur 29 and Orwin 25 years old.
The Rai brothers are not alone in pursuing their dream of flying.
From the beginning of the 20th century,
many people have tried and failed,
and the press quickly took a breath and jumped into these failures.
But the risk of failure and frustration did not make Wilbur and Orwin Rai foolish.
They focused on developing important details,
especially the balancing part.
To be able to fly,
the two brothers realized that all the forces of the airplane
must be balanced perfectly and can change in the direction of the wind.
Thanks to that,
the key to flying is to allow the pilot to control the aircraft accurately and quickly.
The Rai brothers continued to study the theory for many years
before getting started with practical experiments.
By 1899,
by reading a book on birds,
the two brothers came up with a new idea.
Orwin once said,
we can't understand what's wrong with the flying mechanism of birds
that humans can't create on a larger scale and apply.
The locals said,
we can't not think of them as two poor crazy people.
They stand on the beach for hours just to watch the seagulls fly up and down.
They watch the birds go crazy and catch their movements with their hands.
Why did they move from the wings of this bird?
We think they're crazy.
But by moving their hands in this way or that way,
they move their hands up and down in the same way as this bird.
On May 30, 1899,
Wilbur wrote a letter to the Smithsonian.
In the letter, he said that he and his brother
were fascinated by the ability of humans to fly
since their fathers gave them flying toys.
At the same time,
he wanted documents related to this research institute
and wanted to know where he could find these documents.
The Smithsonian office sent him a file with more detailed directions.
With the documents in hand,
the Wright brothers started to research
and started to create to test their theory.
In a precise way,
the Wright brothers' work began with a dissertation
by the German engineer Otto Lilienthal,
who had made thousands of flights using models of wings designed by him.
Drawing experience from the Lilienthal model,
the Wright brothers came up with the idea that
if the head of the wing is curved,
the balance and control of the plane can be done.
With this knowledge,
they worked on the first ship in the summer of 1899.
They brought a test ship to Kitty Harp,
where there was a stable wind from the Atlantic Ocean
and there were many large sand dunes
to reduce the risk of collision when the ship sank.
They continuously tested the ship.
If there was an accident,
the two brothers would find a way to recover themselves.
With each flight,
even with collisions when landing,
the two brothers drew new experiences.
The first test flights took place in September 1900,
when the twin-winged aircraft weighed less than 50 pounds.
It had two fixed wings,
one on top of the other.
It could adjust the curvature
and had a moving propeller in the front.
The pilot let this test sit in the middle of the lower wing,
facing forward.
They agreed never to fly together
to keep the room for the worst-case scenario.
If one died,
the other remained and continued to work.
The first efforts of the Wright brothers were successful.
The aircraft they built reached a height of up to 300-400 feet
at a speed of 30 knots per hour.
Clearly,
they had made an important milestone in aviation history.
12 seconds,
time for the whole world to take off.
Although the milestone was quite impressive at first,
the two brothers continued to work in a passionate way
to continue to improve the facility.
Alvin and Wilbur had built a test room
on their bike shop,
where there was a wind tunnel
consisting of a 6-feet-long wooden box
with a tube opening one end and a fan at the other end.
This allowed them to experience
a variety of wings with different shapes and sizes.
In a few years,
they built a new ship and improved it.
In August 1902,
the two brothers were ready for a new test at Kittyhack.
The result was great.
In less than two months,
they tested nearly 2,000 ships,
one of which was 600-feet long.
Clearly,
the two of them had successfully overcome the energy bar,
and now it was time for an engine.
Unfortunately,
none of the two brothers could build
a light engine for the aircraft.
So,
the two brothers asked for help from Chuck Lee Taylor,
a manufacturer who created a 12-horsepower engine
that could be adjusted,
weighing 152 pounds,
and they created their own fan.
This new plane was called Flyer
and it had two 8.5-feet-long fans
facing each other
so as not to pull the aircraft to one side.
At Kittyhack,
the two brothers took a gamble
to find out who would drive the Flyer first.
Wilbur won,
but during the flight,
he pulled too hard on the steering wheel
and fell.
They lost a few days of repair.
Then,
on Thursday, December 17, 1903,
it was Orville's turn.
At 10.35 a.m.,
with the observation of a small group
of five local people,
the Flyer took off
and flew for a total of 12 seconds
at a distance of 120 feet.
When Orville flew up,
lonely in the sky,
beautiful,
the history of aviation did not move to another direction.
About noon that day,
one of the few witnesses
ran down to the beach and shouted,
They did it!
On that day,
the Rye brothers flew three more flights
and the longest flight lasted 57 seconds,
flying more than half the distance.
These are the first engine-powered flights
in the history of aviation in the world.
The result is
the good things come to those who believe,
the good things come to those who are patient,
and the best things come to those who do not give up.
The Rye brothers spent many years experimenting
and trying
to get an engine-powered aircraft.
And become the first people to fly into the sky,
opening a new era for the development of mankind.