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From 12 seconds at Kitty Hawk to Mars: the Wright Flyer's journey

The first airplane flew for 12 seconds in 1903, and pieces of it have since been to the Moon and Mars.

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The real story

On 17 December 1903, in a freezing wind at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville Wright flew the Flyer for 12 seconds and about 37 metres, shorter than the wingspan of a modern jumbo jet. The brothers took turns; Wilbur's fourth flight that day lasted 59 seconds. Then a gust caught the parked plane and flipped it, breaking its ribs and struts. It never flew again.

Restored, it now hangs in the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. In 1969 Neil Armstrong carried a piece of its propeller wood and wing fabric to the Moon. In 2021 a postage-stamp-sized swatch of the original muslin was taped under the solar panel of NASA's Ingenuity helicopter, which made the first powered, controlled flight on another planet. Its first Mars airfield was named Wright Brothers Field.

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The facts we checked

  • On 17 December 1903 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, the Wright Flyer made the first powered, controlled airplane flight: 12 seconds, about 37 metres
  • After its fourth flight that day, a gust tipped it over; it never flew again
  • Neil Armstrong carried pieces of its wood and fabric to the Moon on Apollo 11 in 1969; a stamp-sized swatch of its wing fabric, taped under the Ingenuity helicopter's solar panel, flew on Mars in 2021

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We checked every number and date on screen before the video was made.

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