Centenary of first Irish powered flight celebrated

THE ROYAL Irish Automobile Club (RIAC) and their friends gathered exactly 100 years ago today for the first powered flight of an Irish aircraft.

The Irish Aero Club had been born at the RIAC premises on Dawson Street in November 1909, and just a month later, on the last day of 1909, members gathered at Hillsborough, Co Down, at the invitation of a founding member, the 25-year-old “mad mechanic” Harry Ferguson of Belfast.

The members had been excited by the displays of flying machines in France and Britain that year, notably an international air show in Reims in August which Ferguson attended.

Ferguson determined he would engage in power-driven flight before the year was out. Gliders had flown here before, but powered flight – with the elusive possibility of control over direction, take-off and landing – was what interested Ferguson.

It was a cold morning in Hillsborough, and weather conditions were not good. There was speculation that a 28mph headwind would be too much for the machine, which might end up being blown backwards if it ever made it into the air.

But the aircraft, made of linen stretched across a wooden frame and encasing a 35-horsepower engine, coughed, spluttered and rose into the sky, flying for a total of just 130 yards.

It was the first powered flight of a heavier-than-air craft in Ireland, and the first flight of an aircraft designed and built in these islands. Ferguson did not go on to become an air baron, however, giving up flying completely when he married in 1913. He later became more popularly known for his tractors.

The second person to fly in Ireland was Belfast woman Lillian Bland, who built her own craft Mayflyand first flew in 1910.

Today at Weston Airport, Dublin, members of the National Aero Club will take to the skies to mark the Hillsborough flight centenary. Among the craft which the club hopes to take to the skies is a biplane, which members hope will recreate the sense of excitement of the early days of air travel.

While for most of us flying is more of a casual experience, the adventurous spirit seems to remain the dominant ethos at the club. Membership numbers more than 2,000 people, engaged in general flying, aerobatics, gliding, hot air ballooning, hang gliding, microlite flying, paragliding, parachuting, skydiving, rotorcraft and aeromodelling.

Speaking to The Irish Times,Tom McCormack, club president, expressed his admiration for "those pioneers of Irish aviation who risked their lives in pursuit of their dreams".

“Today we all benefit from their endeavours. Today’s  sport aviators still share the same sense of adventure and enjoy the thrill and excitement of flying, particularly in modern-day flying machines such as hang-gliders, microlight aircraft, paragliders and paramotors,” he said.

As part of the commemoration, members of the club and the Royal Irish Automobile Club (RIAC) gathered in the garage of the RIAC on Dawson Street recently to replicate a photo of the founding members. The location where the original photograph was taken, on a vehicle turntable in the club’s garage, remains virtually unchanged since the day in 1909 when the members gathered to record the moment.

The founding members included such eminent motor enthusiasts as John Boyd Dunlop, inventor of the pneumatic tyre, his son Johnny, and RJ Mecredy – the “Father of Irish Motoring”, and of course Harry Ferguson.  Sir WDG Goff became the first chairman of the new club.

David Orr, chairman of the RIAC, expressed his pleasure that the pioneering efforts of the members of the Irish automobile club should be commemorated in this fashion.

He said the remarkable group who had pioneered motoring in Ireland had also foreseen the great adventure that aviation would become in the 20th century.