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Aircraft
Flight
has been the dream of humans from the start of recorded history.
The woodcut depicts the escape attempt of Daedalus and his son Icarus from the
island of Crete where they had been imprisoned in the great labyrinth of King
Minos. Daedalus crafted wings of feathers held together by wax and the they
flew from Crete towards the Greek mainland. Icarus failed to head the warning
not to fly close to the sun, the wax melted and this aerial escape ended
in disaster. The wing design was good, the material selection a poor match
to the temperament of one of the pilots, and the event even less probable due
to the low power output of the human arm and chest muscles. |
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