Wright Brothers Day
17 December 2026 — I hopped, I wondered… and then I flew! Come along!
On 17 December 1903, on the sandy dunes near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first controlled, powered, heavier-than-air flight. The first flight, with Orville at the controls, lasted about 12 seconds and covered roughly 120 feet (about 36 metres). The brothers made three more flights that day, the longest, piloted by Wilbur, lasting nearly a minute. The Flyer was a wooden biplane, the brothers designed the propellers themselves, and the engine was built with their mechanic Charlie Taylor. In the United States the day is observed each year with a presidential proclamation, and commemorative ceremonies are held at the flight site. The holiday celebrates the human dream of reaching the sky, and from there the stars. Aviation and space flight today are heirs to those few bold seconds above the sand. The date is fixed on the calendar and does not depend on the phases of the Moon. If the evening sky is clear, look up: where once only birds flew, aircraft and satellites now pass.
Flying across the sky: An ethereal, bluish-silver star figure made of luminous dots and fine lines, like a constellation, shaped as a 1903 wooden biplane with two stacked wings and a small propeller
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