History of aviation

The first passenger and overseas flights

The first passenger flights

Flying back then was a rather windy affair. Imagine that passengers could only fly in open planes! Flying only became more comfortable when the German plane manufacturer Junkers built the first plane with a closed cabin in 1919, enabling the first scheduled flights.

The first overseas flights

In 1927 Charles Lindbergh flew from New York to Paris in 33 hours, 30 minutes and 30 seconds. He had four sandwiches and a bottle of water with him for nourishment. His crossing of the Atlantic was an amazing achievement at the time.

In 1938 a Focke-Wulf Fw 200 became the first landplane to cross the North Atlantic. It took almost 25 hours for the plane to fly the route between Berlin and New York. However, there were no scheduled flights for passengers across the North Atlantic before 1945.

Nowadays a flight from Berlin to New York City takes about 8 and a half hours, whereas it takes about a week to cross by ship.