List of Accidents and Incidents Involving Military Aircraft Before 1925 - 1911

1911

10 May

First U.S. Army pilot casualty, 2nd Lt. George Edward Maurice Kelly (1878–1911), London-born, and a naturalized United States citizen in 1902, is killed when he banks his Curtiss Type IV (or Curtiss Model D), Army Signal Corps serial number 2, sharply to avoid plowing into an infantry encampment near the present site of Fort Sam Houston, Texas. The Aviation Camp (aka Remount Station) at Fort Sam Houston is renamed Camp Kelly, 11 June 1917, then Kelly Field on 30 July 1917, and finally Kelly AFB on 29 January 1948. Airframe rebuilt, finally grounded in February 1914, refurbished, and placed on display in the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum, Washington, D.C. Due to this crash, the commanding officer of Fort Sam Houston bans further training flights at the base, the flying facilities being moved to College Park Airport, College Park, Maryland in June–July 1911. A replica of this airframe is preserved at the National Museum of the United States Air Force.

18 August

The sole Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.1 crashes at Farnborough, pilot Lt. Theodore J. Ridge killed. Ridge was an inexperienced pilot, despite being Assistant Superintendent at the factory (who had only been awarded his Pilot's certificate the day before, and was described as "an absolutely indifferent flyer"). The combination of the unskilled pilot and the marginally controllable aircraft proved fatal - the S.E.1 stalled in a turn and spun in, killing Ridge. No further development of this one-off design undertaken.

17 September

Lieutenant Reginald Archibald Cammell of the British Air Battalion was killed conducting a trial flight of an ASL Valkyrie monoplane Type B with his own engine fitted. The accident was not considered to be due to faults in the aircraft, but to have been caused by Cammell's lack of experience with the aircraft.

18 November

First British seaplane to leave the water, and the first seaplane to take off from British waters, an Avro Type D, the first of six of the type, piloted by Royal Navy Commander Oliver Schwann, lifts off from Cavendish Dock, Barrow-in-Furness, England, briefly, falls back into the water and is damaged. His lack of training betrayed him, and the first take-off was not followed by the first successful landing. The Avro will be repaired.