Giacomo D'Angelis was a Corsican-

Indian Indian or Indians may refer to: Peoples South Asia * Indian people, people of Indian nationality, or people who have an Indian ancestor ** Non-resident Indian, a citizen of India who has temporarily emigrated to another country * South Asia ...

hotelier and

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 air ...

pioneer who piloted the first powered airplane flight in Asia in

Madras (Chennai) Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

, India on 10 March 1910. Giacomo D'Angelis 1572x2565 pixeles (2)

The flight reportedly occurred nine months prior to another published account of a flight in

Allahabad Allahabad (), officially known as Prayagraj, also known as Ilahabad, is a metropolis in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.The other five cities were: Agra, Kanpur (Cawnpore), Lucknow, Meerut, and Varanasi (Benares). It is the administrat ...

. D'Angelis performed the flight in a self-built aircraft.

Life

Giacomo D’Angelis, a confectioner from

Messina Messina (, also , ) is a harbour city and the capital of the Italian Metropolitan City of Messina. It is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, and the 13th largest city in Italy, with a population of more than 219,000 inhabitants in ...

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, arrived in Madras in 1880 and opened his "Maison Francaise" as chef de cuisine, and his excellent service soon enabled him to open a small hotel in 1906, the latter Heritage Hotel d'Angelis at Anna Salai, the former ''Mountain Road', in Chennai.Viola, Antonella Viola (2013
Migration across three continents : the d’Angelis family, Conserveries mémorielles
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D'Angelis 's biplane

The

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

has been built by D'Angelis entirely from his own designs, experimenting with a small horse-power engine. D'Angelis seems to have been inspired by

Louis Blériot Louis Charles Joseph Blériot ( , also , ; 1 July 1872 – 1 August 1936) was a French aviator, inventor, and engineer. He developed the first practical headlamp for cars and established a profitable business manufacturing them, using much of th ...

who was the first to fly across the English Channel in July 1909. D'Angelis tested his aeroplane in

Pallavaram Pallavaram (originally Pallava Puram) is a residential neighborhood of Chennai, India. Pallavaram was a part of Alandur until August 2015 and since then a new taluk with headquarters at Pallavaram was created. The town is known for its canto ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a States and union territories of India, state in southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of India ...

, and then arranged a public viewing in March 1910 reported by the local newspapers. A'Dangeli's made its flight on March 26, 1910: "''We are posting you what we believe is the first aeroplane in India, which has been constructed by one of our customers, Mr. G. D'Angelis of Madras. The machine has been built by our friend entirely from his own design, and we understand that although upto the present he has been experimenting with a small horse-power engine, the results given by this are so satisfactory that with a higher horse-power he anticipates being able to make long and consecutive flights''." The aircraft's engine may have been supplied by E. and A Levetus, and Co. ''

India Weekly ''IndiaWeekly'' is a commercial website serving India and its diaspora, providing them with an online shopping platform for entertainment products like movies, music, and gifts. IndiaWeekly has over one million fans on social networking site Face ...

'' mentioned that the motor of the biplane had been built by Samuel John Green, an engineer of the Simpson's company.

References

External links

archivosdangelis.blogspot.com

kbhargava.com: Aviation in India
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Giacomo D'Angelis Flight in Madras 1910
{{DEFAULTSORT:D'Angelis, Giacomo Indian aviators Italian aviators Italian people of Corsican descent Aviation pioneers Aviation history of India Italian expatriates in India