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  • Author Author: bluescreen
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Did the Wright Brothers really invent powered flight?

bluescreen

History teaches that Wilbur and Orville Wright successfully performed the first motorized human flight on December 17, 1903.

wright brothers flight

 

But were they the first to do so?

 

For years, there has been an alternative theory about a little-known inventor in New Zealand named Richard Pearse. Proponents of Pearse hold that he successfully covered about 350 yards in his motorized airplane on March 31, 1902-- about a year and a half before the Wright brothers' famous experiments at Kitty Hawk.

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Evidence to corroborate Pearse's accomplishments remain vague. There were only a handful of eyewitness accounts, and Pearse, himself, did not document his experiments very well. (Wikipedia accounts of Pearse are rife with "citation needed" tags.) Despite this, Pearse is recognized throughout New Zealand and Australia as one of true pioneers of early flight-- and as the true discoverer of powered flight by many. The national government of New Zealand has even celebrating his accomplishments by erecting state monuments and postage stamps in his honor.

 

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Have we been miscrediting the Wright brothers for inventing human powered flight all this time while forgetting about the true inventor of flight, Richard Pearse?


Tell us what you think in the comments below.

 

Thanks to for pointing this out. image

  • in reply to Dudley

    Another potential candidate for first piloted heavier than air vehicle would of course be the first parachute flight, 1797. No control on that, so piloted is probably in the looser sense of the word.

  • in reply to clem57

    A lot depends on your definition of "flight". What the wright brothers did was to have the trinity of control by wire, onboard power, and onboard pilot, all on a single flight, and all with witnesses.

     

    If you break that down, then the firsts become different. First powered flight goes to an hot air balloon I would say, but even if you dismiss that, Langley had a powered flight in 1896.

     

    First pilot in a heavier than air vehicle would go to an unnamed boy working with Cayley.

     

    Otto Lilienthal discovered that he could control the aircraft by shifting his body weight, in exactly the same way that modern hanggliders do, or in the way the modern personal helicopters work. I would argue that what he was performing there was flight, but it wasn't powered flight.

     

    What the Wright brothers did was to get proper control by wire working including a rudder, and in turn also learned one of the fundamental rules of airplanes; any control input affects two axes, not one. Apply yaw, and you will also get a roll. Apply a roll, and you will also get negative pitch. They worked that out, and realised that you had to get that under control * before * the vehicle took off, because the vehicle has to become a stable air vehicle before it will gain height.

     

    And for the Kitty Hawk, they realised that without readily controlled rudder, the aircraft wouldn't be able to get the speeds required without spinning off because they worked out that as the vehicle's speed increased and friction with the ground counted for less and less, that they needed to apply a sideways force to counter the gyroscopic motion of the engine and prop.

     

    On an aside I learned about Pearse also in NZ, at Canterbury Aero Club.

  • in reply to mcb1

    Not to mention the inherent dangers of having a large amount of hydrogen peroxide and an igniter strapped to your back. No aviation fuel is safe, but Hydrogen Peroxide is probably the least safe!


    Difficult to control, difficult to learn, very little margin for error, inherently explosive. What could possibly go wrong with a jetpack! Kudos to anyone brave enough to try them image

  • in reply to mcb1

    I did not mean to slight New Zealand in any way, I was just pointing out the realities of geographic knowledge at the turn of the 19th Century.

     

    Clearly Pearse needs more publicity if you want his claim added to the record.

     

    Being from Ohio, we seldom even acknowledge that the first flight actually occurred in North Carolina.

     

    The Wright Brothers did more than just fly, they went around showing the world that flight could be a part of the new century.

     

    Their efforts got the ideas going and the real competition to improve the design and extend air travel capabilities.

     

    If you can show that Pearse managed to do as much during the time, then he was indeed needlessly overlooked.

     

    Plus trust me, my name is on a number of lists that would raise inquires should I decide to visit New Zealand.

     

    Sadly, my long distance travelling days are over.

     

    DAB

  • in reply to clem57

    Short fly time with those babies.

     

    Jetpac (which is really a prop driven thruster) does 30 mins and a max altitude of 3000ft.

    There is a video of 5000ft.

     

    Oh ..... and unlike dangerman there is a parachute and the fly by wire technology means the learning time is very short.

     

    Mark