Welcome to Vertipedia!
Vertipedia is a product of the Vertical Flight Society. With data on 867 aircraft, 620 historical milestones, 599 people, and 395 organizations, Vertipedia is your "one-stop shop" for all things vertical lift.
On October 25 in the history of vertical flight:
1933 - The Florine No. 2 tandem helicopter sets a flight endurance record
1958 - First flight of the Piasecki PA-4 Sea Bat
1958 - First untethered vertical take-off and landing of the Short SC.1
1960 - First flight of Vertol 107-II prototype
1994 - First flight of the Bell 430
Featured aircraft
Our latest featured aircraft for October is the Cierva W.11 Air Horse .
The aircraft was designed to provide viable heavy load lifting capability for commercial operations. It employed 3 main rotors all rotating in the same direction. Torque offset was provided by thrust components from the 3 rotors through built-in shaft tilt. The aircraft had a semi-monoquoque structure, a single engine, and a long-stroke undercarriage (5ft) to cope with high rates of descent. A description of the aircraft and its characteristics can be found in the following references,
Source: "The Cierva W-11 Air Horse", J. Gordon Leishman, VERTIFLITE Spring 2003, Page 52
Source: "Discussing the Helicopter", FLIGHT Staff, FLIGHT, December 2nd 1948, Pages 665-668
Vertipedia Notes
Vertipedia notes are brief descriptions of how and why Vertipedia works the way it does. Check back often for the latest note, or view the complete list.
How are 'Featured Aircraft' chosen?
The 'Featured Aircraft' in Vertipedia is usually chosen to highight the depth of data that can be available for a particular aircraft. We try to choose an aircraft that should be interesting to a wide range of users of the database. To this end, we generally cycle between historic or current aircraft but we also occasionally highlight aircraft that may be of interest to a smaller community. We try to change the aircraft on a monthly basis but there is no set period.
Explore Vertipedia
Vertipedia makes it easy for you to find a range of information on vertical flight, including:
- Targeted searches of documents provided by the Vertical Flight Society, as well as public sources from across the internet
- Important milestones that have helped shape the history of vertical flight
- People who have played a role in vertical flight
- Vertical flight aircraft, such as helicopters, tilt rotors and tilt wings, jet-lift VTOL, and more.
