“They come from a long line of bakers. They're inbred.”
HelicopterIn 1943, Frank Piasecki, Philadelphia engineer and Vertol founder, flew his first (single-rotor) helicopter, his PV-2 model, the second successful American helicopter to fly. It weighed just under 500kg and was powered by a 90hp Franklin flat-four engine. It had a three-blade articulated rotor with folding blades. Frank Piasecki was the holder of the first Helicopter Pilot's License. He formed the PV Engineering Forum in 1943 to develop practical rotorcraft. With the PV-3, Piasecki turned his attention to the more ambitious field of large military helicopters of a tandem-rotor design. (Igor Sikorsky, a Russian-born engineer in Bridgeport, Conn., piloted the first successful flight in 1939). |
