Mozhaysky, identified as the "Creator of world's first airplane", on a 1963 Soviet postal stamp. Alexander Fedorovich Mozhaysky Pol. Aleksander Teodorowicz Możajski (also transliterated as Mozhayski, Mozhayskii and Mozhayskiy; russian: Алекса́ндр Фёдорович Можа́йский) ( – ) was an admiral in the

Imperial Russian Navy The Imperial Russian Navy () operated as the navy of the Russian Tsardom and later the Russian Empire from 1696 to 1917. Formally established in 1696, it lasted until dissolved in the wake of the February Revolution of 1917. It developed from ...

of Polish origin

aviation Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. ''Aircraft'' includes fixed-wing and rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-than-air craft such as hot a ...

pioneer, researcher and designer of

heavier-than-air craft An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air. It counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engines. ...

Biography

Mozhaysky was born to Polish parents in

Rochensalm The Second Battle of Svensksund (Finnish: ''Ruotsinsalmi'', Russian: ''Rochensalm'') was a naval battle fought in the Gulf of Finland outside the present day city of Kotka on 9 and 10 July 1790. The Swedish naval forces dealt the Russian f ...

, in the

Grand Duchy of Finland The Grand Duchy of Finland ( fi, Suomen suuriruhtinaskunta; sv, Storfurstendömet Finland; russian: Великое княжество Финляндское, , all of which literally translate as Grand Principality of Finland) was the predecess ...

(present-day

Kotka Kotka (; ; la, Aquilopolis) is a city in the southern part of the Kymenlaakso province on the Gulf of Finland. Kotka is a major port and industrial city and also a diverse school and cultural city, which was formerly part of the old Kymi parish ...

), southern

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

, then part of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

. His father was an admiral in the Imperial Russian Navy, and Mozhaysky graduated from the Sea Cadet Corps in 1841. He spent the next seven years on voyages in the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain. The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and ...

and in the

White Sea The White Sea (russian: Белое море, ''Béloye móre''; Karelian and fi, Vienanmeri, lit. Dvina Sea; yrk, Сэрако ямʼ, ''Serako yam'') is a southern inlet of the Barents Sea located on the northwest coast of Russia. It is s ...

on various vessels, and was commissioned as a lieutenant in 1849. He served with the Baltic Fleet from 1850 to 1852. In 1853 he was selected as a member of Vice Admiral

Yevfimy Putyatin Yevfimiy Vasilyevich Putyatin (russian: Евфи́мий Васи́льевич Путя́тин; November 8, 1803 – October 16, 1883), also known as was an admiral in the Imperial Russian Navy. His diplomatic mission to Japan r ...

’s expedition to the Far East. In August 1853, he demonstrated a working model of a steam engine to various Japanese dignitaries at

Nagasaki is the capital and the largest Cities of Japan, city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. It became the sole Nanban trade, port used for trade with the Portuguese and Dutch during the 16th through 19th centuries. The Hi ...

, from which Japanese inventor

Tanaka Hisashige was a Japanese rangaku scholar, engineer and inventor during the Bakumatsu and early Meiji period in Japan. In 1875, he founded what became the Toshiba Corporation. He has been called the "Thomas Edison of Japan" or "Karakuri Giemon." Biograp ...

was later able to

reverse-engineer Reverse engineering (also known as backwards engineering or back engineering) is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how a previously made device, process, system, or piece of software accompl ...

a Japanese version. In December 1854 he was shipwrecked at

Heda, Shizuoka was a village located in Tagata District, Shizuoka, Japan on the Suruga Bay coast of Izu Peninsula. Views of Mount Fuji can be seen from the village, which is a tourist resort. As of March 1, 2005, the village had an estimated population of 3 ...

when the frigate ''Diana'' sank in the 1854 Ansei-Tōkai earthquake. Mozhaysky assisted in the construction of the schooner ''Heda'' in 1855, which enabled the Russian delegation negotiating the

Treaty of Shimoda The Treaty of Shimoda (下田条約, ''Shimoda Jouyaku'') (formally Treaty of Commerce and Navigation between Japan and Russia 日露和親条約, ''Nichi-Ro Washin Jouyaku'') of February 7, 1855, was the first treaty between the Russian Empire, a ...

to return home. Later in 1855, during the

Crimean War The Crimean War, , was fought from October 1853 to February 1856 between Russia and an ultimately victorious alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and Piedmont-Sardinia. Geopolitical causes of the war included the ...

, he served in the Gulf of Finland on the brig ''Antenor''. In 1858 Mozhaysky was selected to participate in an expedition to Khiva in

Central Asia Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a subregion, region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes t ...

, and published an account of the Aral Sea and the

Amu Darya River The Amu Darya, tk, Amyderýa/ uz, Amudaryo// tg, Амударё, Amudaryo ps, , tr, Ceyhun / Amu Derya grc, Ὦξος, Ôxos (also called the Amu, Amo River and historically known by its Latin name or Greek ) is a major river in Central Asi ...

. He was awarded the

Order of St Vladimir The Imperial Order of Saint Prince Vladimir (russian: орден Святого Владимира) was an Imperial Russian order established on by Empress Catherine II in memory of the deeds of Saint Vladimir, the Grand Prince and the Baptize ...

, 4th class, for his participation in this expedition. After his return he was made a lieutenant-commander; however, he resigned his commission in 1863 with the downsizing of the Russian navy following the end (1856) of the Crimean War. From 1869 to 1876 he lived outside the city of

Vinnytsia Vinnytsia ( ; uk, Вінниця, ; yi, װיניצע) is a city in west-central Ukraine, located on the banks of the Southern Bug. It is the administrative center of Vinnytsia Oblast and the largest city in the historic region of Podillia. ...

in what is now

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

. Mozhaisky's aircraft patent Mozhaysky began work on a project to develop a heavier-than-air aircraft from 1876. Mozhaysky re-enlisted in the navy in 1879 and was granted the rank of captain, 1st class. He became an instructor at the Sea Cadet Corps. He was promoted to rear admiral in July 1882, but resigned shortly thereafter due to domestic reasons. In 1884 Mozhaysky's monoplane made a failed attempt to fly. His design relied upon a ramp rather than on engine power to generate sufficient speed for

lift Lift or LIFT may refer to: Physical devices * Elevator, or lift, a device used for raising and lowering people or goods ** Paternoster lift, a type of lift using a continuous chain of cars which do not stop ** Patient lift, or Hoyer lift, mobil ...

. The wing design of his craft lacked the curvature necessary to generate lift. While it is possible that Mozhaysky's wings slowed his

monoplane A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing con ...

's descent after launch from the ramp, the wings were unlikely ever to have provided sufficient lift for sustained flight unless used at

angles of attack In fluid dynamics, angle of attack (AOA, α, or \alpha) is the angle between a reference line on a body (often the chord line of an airfoil) and the vector representing the relative motion between the body and the fluid through which it is ...

that would have been impractical, given the engines available to Mozhaysky. He also experimented with different angles of attack. Mozhaysky died on April 1, 1890; his tomb is at the Smolensk Cemetery in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

Legacy

In 1909 a Russian newspaper claimed Mozhaysky's hop was the first powered flight. This claim was later repeated in many

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

publications. In 1971-1981

Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute The Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute (also (Zhukovsky) Central Institute of Aerodynamics, russian: Центра́льный аэрогидродинами́ческий институ́т, ЦАГИ, Tsentral'nyy Aerogidrodinamicheskiy Institut, ...

researched the topic and disproved the claim. Mozhaysky's original aircraft was found incapable of generating lift because of low engine capacity. It was also shown that with a more powerful engine, which Mozhaysky had planned shortly before his death, the aircraft might have been able to fly.История конструкций самолётов в СССР до 1938 г.
Шавров В. Б. −3-е изд, исправл. -М. : Машиностроение, 1985 г.Неизвестное об известных. Событие века — полёт человека
Nevertheless, Mozhaysky's aviation achievements, particularly with regard to flight controls and

propulsion Propulsion is the generation of force by any combination of pushing or pulling to modify the translational motion of an object, which is typically a rigid body (or an articulated rigid body) but may also concern a fluid. The term is derived f ...

, were considerable given the limits of the technology available to him, and have only recently received serious attention. The

A.F. Mozhaysky Military-Space Academy A.F. Mozhaysky's Military-Space Academy (russian: Федеральное государственное казённое военное образовательное учреждение высшего профессионального обр� ...

in St Peterburg and asteroid 2850 Mozhaiskij are named in his honour.

References

External links

Flying Machines - Alexander Fyodorovich Mozhaysky

* ttp://www.flyingmachines.org/moz.html ''Aleksandr Fyodorovich Mozhaiski''. flyingmachines.org. Accessed on 03-08-2008.
''History of Aviation. Alexander Mozhaiski''
. spartacus-educational.com. Accessed on 03-08-2008.

. IETC. Accessed on 03-08-2008. * К.С. СТРОИТЕЛЕВ (KS Stroitelev)

. flot.com. Retrieved on 03-08-2008. * "Можайский, Александр Федорович (Mozhaiski, Aleksandr Fedorovich" . airwar.ru (11/10/2007). Retrieved on 03-08-2008. * Андрей Ковтун (Andrei Kobtun) (2004). "Кто первый? (Who was first?)" . "Rodina". Accessed on 03-08-2008. * Виктор ГОНЧАРЕНКО (Viktor Goncharenko). "Как люди научились летать. Самолет А.Ф. Можайского (Since people learned to fly. AFMozhaiski Plane)" . МОО "Наука и техника." Accessed on 03-08-2008. * Андрей ВЕЙМАРН (Andrei Veimarn) (03/07/2006). "Летучка с адскими снадобьями" . politjournal.ru. Accessed on 03-08-2008. {{DEFAULTSORT:Mozhayskiy, Alexander F. 1825 births 1890 deaths People from Kotka People from Viipuri Province (Grand Duchy of Finland) Imperial Russian Navy admirals Aviation inventors Discovery and invention controversies Russian aerospace engineers Russian inventors Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian)

Biography

Legacy

See also

References

External links