Aviation History

Listeners will learn over 100 facts about military sea and military air vehicles, such as helicopters, bombers, and stealth flighters, as well as submarines, mammoth ships, and militarized barges.

Military drones have been part of wars for more than 100 years. Today’s military unmanned aerial vehicles are packed with sensors, high-quality cameras, and even weapons. With each UAV flight, military members are kept safe away from war zones. Young listeners will learn how both aerial and underwater military drones operate and get inside details about some of the missions they’ve completed.

The US Air Force is a powerful military force. But there is more to this high-flying military branch than you might imagine. These surprising facts about the US Air Force will amaze you.

Final Destination: Disaster informs the public, for the very first time, of what actually precipitated the controversial sale of Eastern Airlines - at one time the second largest airline in the free world - to Frank Lorenzo's Texas Air Corporation, which led to its certain demise. This unbelievable story is written by an 18-year veteran Eastern pilot who was intimately involved in many aspects of the tumultuous events that culminated in the sale.

The world's worst air disaster happened more than 40 years ago on a remote Atlantic Ocean island, when two fully loaded 747 passenger jets collided after a horrendous series of human errors. One of the jets, KLM Flight 4805, was traveling more than 150 miles an hour and was within seconds of lifting off when it crashed into Pan Am Flight 1736 taxiing in its path. The loss of lives was staggering - 583 dead. The crash happened after a lengthy series of major and minor human errors. In the intervening years, has aviation advanced to the point that such a disaster can't happen again?

Through clouds and over mountains and farmland... Two flies accompany listeners on an adrenaline-pumping flight over war-torn Europe as the U.S. Army Air Corps' Tuskegee airmen take on a heroic, history-making mission during World War II.

Stephen E. Ambrose, acclaimed author of Band of Brothers and Undaunted Courage, carries us into the skies of World War II aviation, flying aboard the crowded and dangerous B-24 bombers as their crews fought to destroy the German war machine and secured Allied victory. The young men who flew the...

Discover the true story of the women who stood beside some of the greatest heroes of American space travel in this New York Times bestseller that delivers "a truly great snapshot of the times" (Publishers Weekly) that inspired a limited TV series on ABC! As America's Mercury Seven astronauts...

The incredible story of the first African American military pilot, who went on to become a Paris nightclub impresario, a spy in the French Resistance and an American civil rights pioneer Eugene Bullard lived one of the most fascinating lives of the twentieth century. The son of a former slave...

When Henry Forester is shot down during a bombing run over France, the World War II pilot finds himself trapped behind enemy lines. In constant danger of discovery by German soldiers, Henry begins a remarkable journey to freedom. Relying on the kindness of strangers, Henry moves from town to town-traveling by moonlight, never asking questions or even the names of the people who help him along the way. Each day brings him closer to home, yet every step in enemy territory invites new dangers.

Today, mobile connections are so readily accessible that it is perhaps easy to forget the time when only the elite had access to a phone provided by the sole operator: the Government of India. It all changed in the early 1990s as liberalisation stirred the Indian economy out of its decades of...

From the KGB to the Kremlin: a multidimensional portrait of the man at war with the West. Where do Vladimir Putin's ideas come from? How does he look at the outside world? What does he want, and how far is he willing to go? The great lesson of the outbreak of World War I in 1914 was the danger...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “Negroni is a talented aviation journalist who clearly understands the critically important part the human factor plays in aviation safety.” —Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, pilot of US Airways 1549, the Miracle on the Hudson A fascinating exploration...

Informed by unparalleled access to still–secret documents, interviews with top field commanders, and a review of the military’s own internal after–action reports, Cobra II is the definitive chronicle of America’s invasion and occupation of Iraq—a conflict that could not be lost but one...

A New York Times Bestseller * An Amazon Best Book of the Year * A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice * A Time Best Book for Summer Between the world wars, no sport was more popular, or more dangerous, than airplane racing. While male pilots were lauded as heroes, the few women who...

“An intense, immersive deep dive into a wild, dangerous, and unknown world, written with the pace and appeal of a great thriller. This is nonfiction at its very best.”—Lee Child The true story of two doomed ships and a daring search-and-rescue operation that shines a light on the elite...

The life and adventures of Thomas Cochrane, a young man who rose from midshipman to admiral, are so extraordinary that, to paraphrase Patrick O’Brian, one has to suspend disbelief. In fact, O’Brian admitted to using Cochrane as the model for his character Jack Aubrey. Second only to Nelson...

Fifteen-year-old Valya knows what it feels like to fly. She's a pilot who's always felt more at home soaring through the sky than down on earth. But since the Germans surrounded Stalingrad, Valyas been forced to stay on the ground and watch her city crumble. When her mother is killed during the siege, Valya is left with one burning desire: to join up with her older sister, a member of the famous and feared Night Witches - a brigade of young female pilots.

Before becoming an instructor in the Navy's Topgun program, Dave "Bio" Baranek was just another kid with a dream. Upon graduating from college, he joined the Navy with the goal of becoming a fighter pilot. But, his eyesight waning, he knew that he would never be able to reach that goal. Undaunted, he plowed ahead and found his niche as a radar intercept operator in the backseat of the sleek, new Grumman F-14 Tomcat.

The year is 1925. It is sixty degrees below zero. The wind sweeps tons of snow over the deep-frozen Alaskan landscape. The nearest railhead is seven hundred miles away. Airplanes cannot fly. The way to Nome is blocked by a treacherous frozen sound, an icebound port, and mountains to the west...