Description
Scotland’s early aviators played an important role in the development of aviation and in raising public awareness of this innovation. However, the aeroplane’s potential as a weapon of war was quickly realised and the First World War saw significant activity across the lowlands and eastern
parts of the country, particularly in building aircraft, training new pilots and defending against U-boats and Zeppelin attacks. Due to the immaturity of the technology, the fragility and idiosyncrasies of the aircraft of the day and the pressures of war, there were many accidents.
The return of peace followed by the Great Depression saw a significant downturn in aerial activity which lasted until the early 1930s, though there remained a significant Fleet Air Arm presence. By the mid-1930s Scotland was served by several small, pioneering airlines, which, besides flying city-to-city routes, provided air services and ambulance flights to outlying communities. This period also saw the rise of what is now termed General Aviation, with the advent of specialist service companies and wealthy individuals able to buy and fly their own aircraft and the establishment of flying clubs and flying schools.
From about 1936 until the outbreak of the Second World War there was an increase in the FAA and RAF presence, which, inevitably, resulted in crashes.
This fully referenced volume, containing 29 photographs, provides details of over 770 crashes which occurred in Scotland, or were flying from Scotland and crashed elsewhere, between 1905 and the start of the Second World War, in which some 300 people lost their lives.
