Frédéric Airault

Frédéric Airault
Frédéric Airault (left), alongside Alfredo Kindelán and Pedro Vives in the airship "España"
Born(1868-05-18)May 18, 1868
Paris, France
DiedOctober 7, 1944(1944-10-07) (aged 76)
Clichy, France
SpouseMathilde Airault

Frédéric Airault (French: [fʁedeʁik ɛʁo]; born 18 May 1868 in Paris, died 7 October 1944 in Clichy)[1] was a French engineer and airship pilot who was the technical director of a number of automobile and aviation firms before the First World War.

Biography

Airault enrolled at the École des Arts et Métiers campus in Angers in 1884, gaining his diplôme d'ingénieur in 1887. Airault served with the French Navy for five years before joining the Société française de constructions mécaniques in 1892.[2] In 1897, he designed a V-4 24-horsepower engine with progressive friction transmission, and starting in 1899 he worked at the car and bicycle manufacturer Hurtu as engineer, head of research and then Technical Director. He stayed there for four years, and in 1903 became a co-director of the Buchet factories in Levallois-Perret, a northwestern suburb of Paris.[2][3][4][n 1] Élie Buchet, founder of Buchet, had died in late 1903.[6]

Airault left Buchet in 1905 to become the managing director of Fabbrica di Automobili Florentia.[2][n 2] Airault stayed there for a year before becoming the technical director of the Société française des trains Renard in 1906.[2] The Daimler Company manufactured the Road Train under licence in the UK.

The industrialists Henri Deutsch de la Meurthe and Édouard Surcouf formed Société Astra to make dirigible airships. Airault was the director of the aeronautic park for the Astra III airship Ville-de-Nancy (piloted by Édouard Surcouf and fr:Henry Kapférer) at the Exposition Internationale de l'Est de la France in Nancy in 1909.[8] Airault piloted "Osmanli", the first Turkish airship, at the Parc Saint-Cloud on 18 April 1909.[9][10]

He became technical director of Compagnie générale transaérienne[2] (CGT, later Air France, founded in October 1909 by Louis Blériot), which was also owned by Henri Deutsch de la Meurthe.[11][n 3] He oversaw the installation of hydrogen gas plants at Nancy and then at Beauval for CGT.[2][n 4]

While testing the Astra VI l’España on 5 November 1909, the propeller shaft ruptured, breaking the nacelle. Airault avoided a catastrophe, landing safely near Frémainville, Seine-et-Oise (now Val d'Oise), some 50 miles (85 km) from Meaux. Brought back to Beauval, repaired and modified, l’España was delivered to the Spanish military authorities at the start of 1910.[12]

In August 1910, Airault received his pilot-aeronaut certificate for dirigible balloons (along with Robert Balny d'Avricourt.)[13] CGT started operating Astra dirigibles in France and Switzerland. Airault, as the company's chief pilot, directed operations of Surcouf's Astra VII Ville de Lucerne in August 1910 in Lucerne.[2][14][15][16][17] CGT followed this with a seaplane service on Lake Lucerne and Lake Geneva, then cross-channel flights in 1911. Henri de la Meurthe also bought the Nieuport aircraft firm after Edouard Nieuport died in a flying accident in 1911.

In 1912, Airault lived at 25, Rue de Marignan, Paris.[18]

References

Notes
  1. ^ The engine maker Filtz was also based in Levallois: a 75 hp Filtz engine was fitted to the Renard Road Train imported to Britain in 1907 by the Daimler Company.[5]
  2. ^ His replacement at Buchet was Joseph-Ambroise Farcot who owned his own engineering firm.[4] Farcot was soon joined by Alessandro Anzani, on secondment from Alcyon motorcycles whose owner Edmond Gentil had spotted him on a Hurtu motorcycle at a 1903 World Championship at the Parc des Princes, Paris.[7] The appearance of the first of the Farcot-Anzani 3-cylinder fan engines (80 x 80 mm, 1206 cc) in an Alcyon motorcycle was announced in (L'Automobile, No. 109, 28 October 1905).[4]
  3. ^ Blériot had used an Anzani 3-cylinder W fan engine of about 3 litres to power the Blériot IX across the English Channel on 25 July 1909 (he had previously used Antoinette engines).
  4. ^ These were possibly water gas plants for continuous production of hydrogen. See "l'usine oxhydrique". MeauXfiles. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
Citations
  1. ^ "Asnières-sur-Seine (Hauts-de-Seine, France) - Indexes of inheritance (in French: Tables de successions et absences) | 1944 - 1945". Geneanet. Retrieved 2024-12-12.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Lagrange 1910.
  3. ^ Automobiles Buchet 1898-1930. kazeo.com (in French). Retrieved 21 March 2016.
  4. ^ a b c "L'héritage d'Élie Buchet (4ème partie)". Z'humeurs & Rumeurs (in French). 13 November 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2016.
  5. ^ Martin, Liz (February 2013). "The Renard Road Train system". Transmission (20): 8–12. Archived from the original on 31 March 2016. Retrieved 20 March 2016.
  6. ^ "L'héritage d'Élie Buchet (2ème partie)". Z'humeurs & Rumeurs (in French). 11 October 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2016.
  7. ^ Dupont, Daniel (ed.). "La moto en France: L'ere des pionniers". moto-histo.com (in French). Archived from the original on 24 July 2016. Retrieved 21 March 2016.
  8. ^ "Airship News: "Ville de Nancy"'s long voyage" (PDF). Flight: 449. 24 July 1909. Also same page, report of Blériot's burnt foot on the day before his channel crossing...
  9. ^ Leroy, Serge. "1909, année de l'aéroplane. 1ère partie" (PDF) (in French). Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 April 2016. Retrieved 21 March 2016.
  10. ^ Leiser, Gary (2005). "The Dawn of Aviation in the Middle East: The First Flying Machines over Istanbul". Air Power History, Vol. 52. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  11. ^ Hartmann 2006, p. 2.
  12. ^ "Le parc aérostatique de Meaux-Beauval (page 2)". MeauXfiles. Archived from the original on 7 February 2012. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  13. ^ "Foreign Aviation News: Ae.C.F. Doings" (PDF). Flight: 648b. 13 August 1910. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  14. ^ "Bibliographie" (PDF). Le Littoral (in French). Cannes. 19 August 1910. p. 3d. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  15. ^ "Airship and Balloon News: 'Ville de Lucerne' a success" (PDF). Flight: 697. 27 August 1910. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  16. ^ Short newsreel clip of "Astra Airship 1910". British Pathé. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  17. ^ Silver 1910 Medal commemorating the Ville de Lucerne. Retrieved 22 March 2016
  18. ^ Paris-Hachette 1912, p. 3. (in French).
Sources