This is a list of aviation-related events from 1921:
Events Mexicana de Aviación begins service. The Imperial Japanese Navy acquires its first rigid and semi-rigid airships.Peattie, Mark R., Sunburst: The Rise of Japanese Naval Air Power 1909-1941, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2001, , p. 15. In an early experiment with the use of airplanes to attack large ships at sea, French Navy Capitaine de corvette (Corvette Captain) Paul Teste makes a shallow mock dive-bombing attack on the battleship during fleet maneuvers and places a dummy practice bomb only off Bretagne'''s bow. Teste's plane crashes into the sea during his pullout maneuver, but he survives unharmed. The Italian General Giulio Douhet publishes his highly influential book Command of the Air. In it, he argues that the ability of aircraft to fly over armies and navies renders those forces of secondary importance; that the vastness of the sky makes defense against bombers impossible; that only offensive bombing to destroy the enemys air force can allow a country to achieve command of the air; that once it is achieved, a bombing campaign can be carried out against enemy "vital centers", including industry, transportation, government, communications, and "the will of the people;" and that success against enemy civilian morale in particular would be the key to victory. When the Italian Chief of the Naval Staff Admiral Paolo Thaon di Revel argues for the development of aircraft carriers, saying "the development and use of aeroplanes in wars on our seas and along our coasts is today the most essential element of national defense," Minister of the Navy Admiral Giovanni Sechi replies that aircraft carriers are unnecessary in an enclosed sea like the Mediterranean and that a perfectly good substitute for them is "a well-organized network of coastal air stations."Gooch, John, Mussolini and His Generals: The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy, 1922–1940, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007, , p. 50.
January January 6 – After modifications, returns to service with the Royal Navy as the worlds first aircraft carrier equipped with palisades.Sturtivant, Ray, British Naval Aviation: The Fleet Air Arm, 1917–1990, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1990, , p. 215. Installed on the port and starboard edges of the flight deck and capable of being raised and lowered, the palisades when raised serve as a windbreak and prevent aircraft on the flight deck from blowing or rolling overboard in heavy weather.
February Concerned that the transcontinental U.S. Air Mail service established in September 1920 had turned out to be little faster – although much more expensive – than train-only service because the United States lacks a system of lighted navigation beacons, meaning that air mail pilots could not fly safely at night and trains had to carry air mail along the route during the hours of darkness, Assistant Postmaster General of the United States Otto Praeger stages four experimental day-and-night air mail flights as a publicity stunt before incoming President Warren G. Harding can take office on March 4 and appoint his successor. The flights consist of two eastbound and two westbound trips between New York City and San Francisco, California. The two westbound flights become stranded in Dubois, Pennsylvania, and Chicago, Illinois. The first eastbound flight ends in tragedy when the de Havilland DH-4B carrying the mail stalls and crashes after takeoff from Elko, Nevada. The only real success is by the second eastbound flight, whose pilot manages to fly at night from North Platte, Nebraska, to Chicago.Jensen, Richard, "The Suicide Club," Aviation History, May 2017, p. 64. February 10 – The United States Army Air Service′s Air Service School at Langley Field, Virginia, is renamed the Air Service Field Officers School. February 26 – French pilot Adrienne Bolland sets an altitude record of in a Caudron G.3 flying from Buenos Aires.
March A fire destroys much of the Air Services Medical Research Laboratory in Mineola, New York. March 4 – The first sustained flight of the Caproni Ca.60 Transaereo nine-wing flying boat prototype ends in a crash into the surface of Lake Maggiore. March 22 – A Portuguese Naval Aviation Felixstowe F.3 flying boat makes the first flight between Continental Portugal and Madeira. Its four-man crew includes Sacadura Cabral and Gago Coutinho. March 27–28 – The Italian Fascist newspaper Il Popolo d'Italia co-sponsors a conference in Milan that calls for the Government of Italy to establish an independent air ministry and concludes that "the air force is about to become the decisive arm in the future conflicts between peoples and therefore the means must be readied to safeguard the command of our skies."Gooch, John, Mussolini and His Generals: The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy, 1922–1940, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007, , p. 54. March 28 – The Government of Australia creates the Civil Aviation Branch as a component of the Department of Defence. March 31 – The Australian Air Force is formed as an independent air force.
April Phoebe Fairgrave becomes the first woman to perform a double parachute drop when she jumps from an airplane, opens a parachute, cuts it loose, free-falls, then opens a second parachute. April 1 – French pilot Adrienne Bolland flies a Caudron G.3 from Mendoza, Argentina, to Santiago, the first flight across the Andes by a woman. April 11 – Bert Hinkler sets a new distance record in Australia, flying an Avro Baby 800 miles (1,288 km) from Sydney to Bundaberg in 8 hours 40 minutes. April 18 – The first military flight in Honduras takes place when an American pilot under contract to the Honduran military flies a Bristol F.2b Fighter.
May American stunt pilot Laura Bromwell sets a womens aviation speed record of 135 mph (217 km/h) over a course.Daniel, Clifton, ed., Chronicle of the 20th Century, Mount Kisco, New York: Chronicle Publications, 1987, , p. 280. The French airline Société Générale de Transports Aérien (SGTA) extends its Paris-Brussels route to Amsterdam. It uses the Farman F.60 Goliath on the route. May 2 – Italian World War I ace Giovanni Ancillotto makes a flight across the Andes in Peru, flying from Lima to Cerro de Pasco in an Ansaldo A.1 Balilla in 1 hour 35 minutes, after which he spends 15 minutes flying over Cerro de Pasco before landing. He makes the flight at an average altitude of 5,500 meters (18,044 feet), reaches a maximum altitude of 7,000 meters (22,966 feet) while passing Mount Meiggs, and covers the 123-kilometer (76-mile) portion of the flight from Lima to La Oroya at an average speed of 230 km/h (143 mph). May 13 – Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini qualifies as a pilot.Gooch, John, Mussolini and His Generals: The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy, 1922–1940, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007, , p. 39. May 15 – Laura Bromwell sets a womens record for consecutive loops, looping her airplane 199 consecutive times in 1 hour 20 minutes over New York State.Gunston, Bill, ed., Aviation: Year by Year, London: Amber Books Limited, 2001, cited at Wings Over Kansas: Aviation History: Aviation History Facts: May May 24 – French pilot Adrienne Bolland flies a Caudron G.3 from Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Montevideo, Uruguay. It is the first flight over the length of the Río de la Plata by a woman. May 25 – The Belgian airline Société Nationale pour l'Etude des Transports Aériens (SNETA) opens a Brussels-Croydon Airport (London) route, using the Farman F.60 Goliath.
June Boeing wins a $1,448,000 contract to build 200 Thomas-Morse MB-3 fighters for the US Army, allowing the company to abandon furniture-making. June 1 – On the second day of the Tulsa race massacre, whites in six biplane trainer aircraft from nearby Curtiss-Southwest Field attack African-Americans on the ground in the Greenwood section of Tulsa, Oklahoma, with rifles and incendiary bombs.Madigan, Tim, The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921, New York: St. Martin's Press, 2001, , pp. 4, 131-132, 144, 159, 164, 249.McCabe, Scott, "Crime History: Dozens Killed During Tulsa Race Riot", The Washington Examiner, May 31, 2013, p. 8. June 5 – Twenty-four-year-old American stunt pilot Laura Bromwell dies in the crash of her Curtiss JN Canuck at Mitchel Field in Mineola, Long Island, New York, when she loses control at the top of a loop and her aircraft plummets into the ground from an altitude of 1,000 feet (305 m). June 8 – The United States Army Air Service carries out the first experiment in cabin pressurisation in a trial flight using a de Havilland DH.4 with a metal tank with a viewport built into the cockpit and serving as a pressure cabin. The pressure cabin malfunctions, rapidly overpressuring to — i.e., below sea level — and its air compressor pumps air into the cabin more rapidly than it can escape, driving the cabin temperature up to . In extreme discomfort, the pilot barely lands the plane, and further experimentation is abandoned. June 13 – The U.S. Army and United States Navy begin trials in Chesapeake Bay to test the effectiveness of aircraft in attacking ships. The captured German destroyer G-102, light cruiser Frankfurt, and battleship Ostfriesland will all be sunk by aerial bombing during the tests. June 15 – 29-year-old Bessie Coleman, having attended flying school in France, gets her pilot's licence and becomes the first African American to earn an international pilot's licence. June 23 – Airco DH.10 Amiens aircraft of the Royal Air Force′s No. 216 Squadron begin an air mail service between Cairo and Baghdad. June 28 – The Air Navigation and Transport Act becomes law. It gives the British Empire authority over all air navigation in the British Commonwealth of Nations and their territories and puts the International Commission for Air Navigation into effect throughout the Commonwealth..
July
Donald W. Douglas founds the Douglas Company.Angelucci, Enzo, The American Fighter: The Definitive Guide to American Fighter Aircraft From 1917 to the Present, New York: Orion Books, 1987, , p. 182. July 7 – Fire destroys the U.S. Navy blimp C-3 at Naval Air Station Hampton Roads in Norfolk, Virginia. July 10 – Flying from Curtiss Northwest Airport in Minnesota in a Curtiss Oriole piloted by her future husband, Vernon Omlie, Phoebe Fairgrave sets a world women's parachuting record, jumping from and landing safely in a field near New Brighton, Minnesota. July 16 – The sixth annual Aerial Derby is held, sponsored by the Royal Aero Club, with a trophy and a £500 prize for the overall winner and prizes of £200, £100, and £50 for the first three places in the handicap competition. Nineteen participants fly over a 102.5-mile (165-kilometer) circuit beginning and ending at Hendon Aerodrome in London with control points at Brooklands, Esher, Purley, and Purfleet; the aircraft fly the circuit twice. J. H. James is both the overall winner and the winner of the handicap competition, completing the course in a Gloster Mars at an average speed of 163.34 mph (262.87 km/h) in 1 hour 18 minutes 10 seconds with a handicap of 4 minutes 42 seconds. However, Harry Hawker has been killed on July 12 in a crash while practising. July 21 – United States Army Air Service Martin NBS-1 bombers sink the decommissioned German battleship Ostfriesland in the Atlantic Ocean off the Virginia Capes after Billy Mitchell argued for bombing trials to show the power of aircraft to sink major warships.Chant, Chris, The Worlds Great Bombers, New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 2000, , p. 48.
August