The wing is the thing

First, the facts: Nobody had to invent the wing.

This critical device that makes human flight possible existed long before humans did. As much as 228 million years ago the species known as Pterosaurs were flying around the ancient skies just fine. Humans came late to the game.

It’s not that humans were stupid, lazy, or disinterested that held us back from flying. Initially, our excuse was that we didn’t yet exist — which is a very powerful argument for lagging behind in the development of anything.

When we finally did arrive on the scene, the two main issues that caused us to flounder on this whole flying thing were a simple misunderstanding combined with a lack of appropriate technology.

It took a long time to correct those two problems.

The misunderstanding was that flight was possible. It was known. Birds (which ironically descended from ground bound dinosaurs, not flight capable Pterosaurs) flew. They were everywhere, making flight look simple and easy and eminently practical. And so, humans tried to fly by copying birds.

Spoiler alert. That didn’t work.

The core of the problem is a lack of understanding that for birds the wing is a lifting device, a control device, and a source of power. That’s not the case when it comes to human flight.

Sadly, far too many humans tested the limits of Darwinian Theory by attempting to fly their human-powered contraptions from a great height. Rather than attempting to lift themselves up from the ground, they chose to fly like a bird leaving the nest. It didn’t work out well.

By the latter days of the 19th century the boys from Ohio had stumbled onto a whole new idea — a concept that had been missed by their fellow developers. The wing they designed could provide lift and control. The power necessary to fly would come from an entirely different source.

Most aeronautical hopefuls of the day had developed a wing of sorts, although the properties of lift were not generally well understood. They had developed a source of power, too, although those engines were far too heavy and produced relatively benign quantities of power. Control was often overlooked entirely.

It was the Wright brothers who understood that the wing was actually an airfoil, a fixed structure that could develop lift if moved through the air at a rapid enough pace. They also realized that wind blowing back across the wing was as lift producing to the wing as an engine pushing the craft forward. And most importantly of all, it was Orville and Wilbur, a couple of boys from the mighty Midwest, who realized that the propeller might be the most important airfoil of all.

Had the Wrights patented their remarkably efficient propeller design rather than their wing warping control system, the early days of aviation might have been hampered by far fewer lawsuits, while the Wright’s would have become unimaginably wealthy from the licensing rights every other aircraft manufacturer would have been paying them.

Yes, it was a missed opportunity, but the boys did something remarkable all the same, and they did it without the benefit of government funding, angel investors, initial public offerings, or robbing the local bank.

They threw the rock that shattered the aeronautical glass ceiling — the one that prevented humans from leaving the ground, climbing to altitude, then settling back to earth once again under the control of human hands the entire time.

The Wright Flyer main wing was a study in rudimentary architecture. It works thanks to its massive size and shape, provided by a skeleton of curved wood ribs. Basically, it is a collection of nothing but sticks. The wings are so marginal in strength they droop downward at the tips, pulled earthward by their own weight.

Textile technology gave them a fabric known as muslin to cover the wing’s single surface. The term “muslin” refers to a fabric of a specific fiber, thread size, and weave. In 1903 it was 100% cotton, reasonably strong, and relatively light. They did not cover the fabric with dope, however. That was an as-yet to be developed technology that would provide yet another enormous leap forward in the efficiency and practicality of these new flying machines.

By the time the sun set on Dec. 17, 1903, perhaps the most important test aircraft in human history had successfully flown four times, been destroyed in an accident, and sparked a firestorm of imagination, experimentation, and development that continues to this day.

Airfoil design became a specialty. Engineers plotted individually and in groups to design wings that could provide increased lift and greater speed. They dreamed up wings of every shape and size. Some were enormous, others were tiny. Compare the wingspan, shape, and intended use of Howard Hughes’ Spruce Goose and Kelly Johnson’s F-104 to see a remarkable contrast of wing design.

Today, the progress of aeronautical design continues. Those of us who are lucky enough to have flown an Icon A5 know full well that wing design has come a very long way over just the past couple decades.

Not only do the A5’s wings fold for easy storage or trailering the machine from home to airport (or a sufficiently large body of water), these composite lifting devices are so astoundingly well engineered they simply do not want to stall. The airplane mushes along without an aggressive drop of the nose or a sizable dip from one wing.

Similarly, it just doesn’t want to spin. Even if the pilot puts effort into it, this amazing amphib design doesn’t want to depart from controlled flight.

We’ve come a long way baby, thanks to the dreamers, the schemers, the engineers, and those who risked their investments to make it all happen.

What’s around the corner? What will the future bring us? It’s impossible to say with certainty.

Whatever comes our way, or our children’s way, I suspect it will be nothing short of amazing. That’s the history of human beings and their love affair with aviation.

I’m just glad I got to be here to see it, to participate in it, and to benefit from the work of others who make the most of it.