It's safe, honest

It is not my intention to draw any fire away from the Wright brothers and their famous flight at Kittyhawk. What they accomplished was nothing short of spectacular. If not mind bendingly dangerous. Think about it, these were bicycle mechanics who had built a hand made airplane, powered by a hand made engine, launching into high winds with not so much as a seat to sit on.

But just look at some of the other guys who made it into the air before them. How about Clément Ader? Who in 1890 made the first powered heavier than air flight. Now there is debate about how much control of the contraption he really had, but none the less, he did fly and it was powered. Let's take a look at some of the stuff he did before he flew his bat winged monster. He devised stereophonic sound, designed the V8 engine and was largely credited for making the telephone actually useful, installing Paris's first phone system in 1880.

OK, so he was smart, and a real engineer. When he turned his energies to flight however, things got weird. He created an airplane called the Eole. It has a 12 metre wingspan, was powered by a steam engine (Lord Jesus) and like the Wright brothers, 13 years to come, controlled (I use the term loosely) the machine by bending and warping the wings.

The genius of Ader was the engine was actually very light weight with the whole machine weighed in at just over 300 kilos. He`s in the history books with the first powered flight on October 6, 1890. The airplane flew about 50 metres. Unlike other airplanes, including the Wright brother`s, his plane was not catapulted or launched from a track into high winds. It took off.

He built other bat planes, claiming that each one flew farther each time and after being spotted by the French military, built a much bigger bat winged beats powered by 2 steam engines that in 1897 flew over 300 metres. Little real evidence exists of any of the other bat planes working, and in any case, the military got bored and walked away. Too bad. It would be neat to see a 4 engine steam powered bat passenger plane.