This is a list of aviation-related events from 1957.
January
- The Avro Vulcan strategic bomber enters service with the Royal Air Force. It begins to enter squadron service during the summer of 1957.[5]
- January 3 – Trans World Airlines becomes the first airline to offer its passengers freshly brewed coffee in flight.[6]
- January 4 – The Brooklyn Dodgers become the first professional baseball team to purchase its own airplane, buying a Convair CV-440. To reduce the CV-440's price to US$775,000, the team purchases it as part of a larger Eastern Airlines order.[7]
- January 18 – Three United States Air Force B-52 Stratofortress bombers make the world's first round-the-world, non-stop flight by turbojet-powered aircraft. They complete the flight in 45 hours 19 minutes, at an average speed of 534 mph (859 km/h).
- January 31 – A Douglas DC-7B being operated by the Douglas Aircraft Company on a test flight with a crew of four prior to delivery to Continental Airlines collides in mid-air over California's San Fernando Valley with a U.S. Air Force F-89J Scorpion on a test flight with a crew of two to check its radar equipment. The F-89J crashes in La Tuna Canyon in the Verdugo Mountains, killing its pilot and injuring the other crew member, who ejects to a parachute landing in Burbank, California. The DC-7B remains airborne for several minutes, dropping debris into neighborhoods below, before crashing into the grounds of a church and the athletic field of Pacoima Junior High School in the Pacoima district of Los Angeles, California, where 220 boys are gathered; the crash kills all four people on the plane and three boys on the ground, and injures an estimated 74 students. Among the dead on the DC-7B is its copilot, test pilot and actor Archie Twitchell.[8]
March
- All 11 of the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm's Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve squadrons are disbanded due to a reduction in British defence expenditures.[9]
- March 1 – SNCASE (or Sud-Est) and SNCASO (or Sud-Ouest) merge to form Sud Aviation.[10]
- March 4–15 – A United States Navy blimp sets a duration record for a non-rigid airship, traveling 9,448 miles (15,205 km) in 264 hours 12 minutes.
- March 5 – A Blackburn Beverley C Mark I heavy transport aircraft of No. 53 Squadron, Royal Air Force, crashes in the village of Sutton Wick, then in Berkshire, England, killing 18 of the 22 people on board and two people on the ground.
- March 11 – A Flying Tiger Line Lockheed Super Constellation sets a new payload record for a commercial aircraft, carrying 41,749 pounds (18,937 kg) on a flight between Newark, New Jersey, and Burbank, California.
- March 14 – The Vickers Viscount G-ALWE, operating as British European Airways Flight 411, crashes into a house in Wythenshawe, England, while on approach to Manchester Airport. All 20 people on board die, as do two people in the house.
- March 17 – The Philippine Air Force Douglas C-47 Skytrain Mt. Pinatubo crashes on the slopes of Mount Manunggal on Cebu in the Philippines, killing 25 of the 26 people on board. Among the dead are President of the Philippines Ramon Magsaysay, other high-ranking Philippine government officials, and former Philippine Senator Tomas Cabili; the only survivor is Philippine Herald newspaper correspondent Nestor Mata.
May
- The national airline of Ecuador, Ecuatoriana de Aviación, is founded. It will begin flight operations in August.
- May 1 – An Eagle Aviation Vickers VC.1 Viking crashes into trees near Blackbushe Airport in Yateley, Hampshire, England, killing 34 of the 35 people on board.
- May 10 – The wreckage of Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 810, a Canadair North Star, is found on Mount Slesse, near Chilliwack, British Columbia, Canada. The airliner had been missing since December 9, 1956. All 62 people on board had died in the crash.[8]
- May 15 – A Royal Air Force Vickers Valiant drops the first British hydrogen bomb, over Kiritimati.
- May 22 – A United States Air Force B-36 Peacemaker ferrying a Mark 17 thermonuclear bomb from Biggs Air Force Base in El Paso, Texas, to Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico, accidentally drops the bomb 4.5 miles (7.2 km) south of the Kirtland control tower and 0.3 miles (0.48 km) west of Sandia Base while on approach to Kirtland. The weapon is destroyed by the detonation of its high-explosive material, creating a crater 12 feet (3.7 m) deep and 25 feet (7.6 m) in diameter and nuclear material is released into the environment, but no nuclear explosion occurs.[14][15]
June
- Middle East Airlines leases an Avro York cargo aircraft.
- June 1 – East Germany merges the headquarters of its air force, the Luftstreitkräfte der Nationalen Volksarmee ("Air Forces of the National People's Army") with those of its Luftverteidigung (air defense) force, forming a new headquarters called the Kommando LSK/LV ("Air Force/Air Defense Command").
- June 2 – In Manhigh I, the first flight of the United States Air Force's Project Manhigh, Air Force Captain Joseph Kittinger sets a new world balloon altitude record of 29,500 meters (96,800 feet), breaking Auguste Piccard's record set in May 1931.
- June 7 – Executing a zoom climb after a low-altitude pass during a high-speed demonstration flight at Hensley Field in Dallas, Texas, for a graduating class from the Naval Postgraduate School, a Vought F8U-1 Crusader fighter flown by a Chance Vought Aircraft pilot disintegrates, killing the pilot. The aircraft's wreckage explodes violently at low altitude over Main Street in adjacent Grand Prairie, Texas, inflicting minor injuries to several bystanders.[16][17]
- June 28 – The Moroccan airline Royal Air Maroc—Compagnie Nationale de Transports Aériens renames itself Royal Air Maroc.
July
- During an emergency evacuation rehearsal, Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes the first President of the United States to fly in a helicopter. The aircraft is piloted from the White House in Washington, D.C. to Camp David in Maryland by a U.S. Air Force officer.[18]
- July 16
- The Lockheed 1049E Super Constellation Neutron (PH-LKT), operating as KLM Flight 844, crashes into Cenderawasih Bay off the Biak Islands in Netherlands New Guinea, just after takeoff from Biak-Mokmer Airport while turning at low altitude to make a low-level pass over the airport. Fifty-eight of the 68 people on board die.
- Flying a Vought F8U-1P Crusader photographic reconnaissance aircraft, United States Marine Corps Major John H. Glenn sets a North American transcontinental speed record, flying from Los Alamitos, California, to Floyd Bennett Field in New York City nonstop in 3 hours, 28 minutes, 50 seconds, at an average speed of 723.517 mph (1,164.388 km/h) with three aerial refuelings.[19][20]
- July 19 – A U.S. Air Force Northrop F-89J Scorpion launches a live AIR-2 Genie ("Ding Dong") unguided nuclear air-to-air missile. It is the only detonation of a Genie.[1]
- July 28 – A United States Air Force C-124 Globemaster II carrying three nuclear bombs over the Atlantic Ocean jettisons two of the bombs after experiencing a loss of power. The bombs are never recovered.[21]
- July 31 – The Distant Early Warning (DEW) Line, a chain of radar stations designed to warn the United States and Canada of Soviet bombers approaching North America, begins operations.[22]
August
- An experimental Fleet Air Arm flight of Supermarine Scimitars forms at Royal Naval Air Station Ford, the first unit to be equipped with the aircraft. The Scimitar is the Royal Navy's first transonic swept-wing aircraft as well as its first aircraft capable of carrying a nuclear weapon.[23]
- The national airline of Ecuador, Ecuatoriana de Aviación, begins flight operations.
- August 1 – The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is formed to co-ordinate U.S. and Canadian air defense.
- August 19–20 – In Manhigh II, the second flight of the United States Air Force's Project Manhigh, Air Force Major David Simons sets a new world balloon altitude record of 30,942 meters (101,516 feet), breaking Joseph Kittinger's record set in June. Simons is aloft for 32 hours.
- August 21 – The U.S. Air Force formally cancels the XF-103 Mach 3 interceptor aircraft program.[24]
- August 28 – A rocket-boosted Royal Air Force English Electric Canberra sets a new world altitude record of 70,308 ft (21,430 m).
September
- September 7 – A United States Marine Corps helicopter transports a President of the United States for the first time, when the commanding officer of Marine Helicopter Squadron One (HMX-1), Virgil D. Olson, flies Dwight D. Eisenhower from Newport, Rhode Island to the White House in Washington, D.C. The flight begins the Marine Corps's association with presidential helicopter transportation, which it shares with the United States Army until 1976 before taking exclusive responsibility.[18]
- September 12 – The United States and Canada establish the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD), integrating the headquarters of the U.S. Continental Air Defense Command and the Royal Canadian Air Force's Air Defense Command and responsible for the defense of North America against air attack. NORAD will be renamed the North American Aerospace Defense Command in March 1981.
- September 29 – Trans World Airlines inaugurates service via the polar route from Los Angeles, California, to London, England, using the Lockheed L-1649A Starliner.[6]
- September 30 – Austrian Airlines is formed from the merger of Air Austria and Austrian Airways
November
- Delivery of the Handley Page Victor strategic bomber to the Royal Air Force begins.[5]
- November 4 – A Romanian government Ilyushin Il-14P carrying some of the most prominent officials of the Romanian Workers' Party – including Grigore Preoteasa, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, Leonte Răutu, Chivu Stoica, Alexandru Moghioroș, Ștefan Voitec, and Nicolae Ceaușescu – strikes treetops in fog and crashes while on approach to Moscow's Vnukovo Airport in the Soviet Union, killing four of the 16 people on board. Preoteasa, Romania's Minister of Foreign Affairs, is among the dead, and Ceaușescu, Romania's future dictator, is injured.[27]
- November 6 – A prototype of the Bristol Britannia crashes in Downend, England, during a test flight, killing all 15 people on board and injuring one person on the ground.
- November 7 – The Security Resources Panel of the President's Science Advisory Committee, chaired by Horace Rowan Gaither, submits "Deterrence & Survival in the Nuclear Age" – commonly referred to as the "Gaither Report" – to President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Among other things, the report finds that there is "little likelihood of SAC's [i.e., the U.S. Strategic Air Command's] bombers surviving" a Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) attack "since there was no way to detect an incoming attack until the first [ICBM] warhead landed,"[28] and it recommends a significant strengthening of U.S. strategic offensive and defensive military capabilities.
- November 8 – The Pan American World Airways Boeing 377 Stratocruiser 10-29 Clipper Romance of the Skies, operating as Flight 7, crashes in the Pacific Ocean during a flight from San Francisco, California, to Honolulu in the Territory of Hawaii, killing all 44 people on board.
- November 15 – After taking off from England's Southampton Water, an Aquila Airways Short Solent flying boat develops engine trouble and crashes on the Isle of Wight while attempting to return. Forty-five of the 58 people on board die in what at the time is the second-deadliest aviation accident to have taken place in the United Kingdom and then the worst ever air disaster to occur in England.
The deadliest crash of this year was Maritime Central Airways Flight 315, a Douglas DC-4 which crashed in Issoudun, Quebec, Canada on 11 August, killing all 79 people on board.
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