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Thanks Partha Kansabanik for the questionWoww so many questions…. I will try to answer as much as I can, which will be specific to each questionWhat is the Kerala gold smuggling scam? What are the details?I have already explained this part in another answer of mine. Please check the link below.Arun Mohan (അരുൺ മോഹൻ)'s answer to What is so serious about the Kerala gold smuggling case and the state government facing political heat?Who are responsible for this crime?Well, it’s an ongoing investigation, so we can expect more characters to pop up. As of now, i.e, 10th of July 2020, I think, the following characters are likely to be the main accusedOfficially case registeredSwapna Suresh- Former Executive Secretary to Consul General of UAE to Kerala - indicated as Kingpin of the case, currently absconding.2. Sarith Nair- Former PRO to Consulate of UAE - Thiruvananthapuram and the man, who went to clear the cargo at the airport, allegedly on behalf of Consul General of UAE.3. Sandeep Nair - a friend of Swapna Suresh, a driver, who suddenly became immensely rich overnight, through, establishing few automotive showrooms.Unofficially indicated (Allegations)Jamal Husein Rahma Husein al Zaabi - H.E The Consul General of UAE to KeralaRashid Khamis Al Sheimeili - H.E The Deputy Consul General of UAE to Kerala under whose name - the packet came.Un-named - Commercial Attache’ of UAE Consulate Thiruvananthapuram (Emirati officer)Fazil, an Indian, who runs Al Zaatar Spices and Foodstuff in Sharjah, who is alleged to have packed the food stuff and other materials meant for Consulate. It was he, who prepared and handled the package, while in UAE, which carried UAE seal.The case was investigated by Kochi Customs Commissionerate, but few hours ago, the Govt of India, had transferred, this case to NIA as it involves national security as well as international connections. Kochi NIA office is likely to take up the case.As it involved UAE diplomats, UAE’s State Security Directorate (SSD) along with Federal Police, is also investigating, on this case about the source of the consignment and how it came under UAE Govt sealed baggage.Is the Chief Minister's Office involved in this scam, as alleged by the opposition parties in Kerala?Well, directly - Kerala CMO isn’t involved with this case. Infact, it has nothing to do with CMO in any manner.But where is the connection?Swapna Nair, after leaving the position of Executive Secretary of UAE Consulate in Trivandrum in Dec 2019, have joined in Kerala Govt’s Space Park project.Space park (India’s first Space Park) is a JV between Kerala IT Department and ISRO, which is under planning stage and lot of project planning and consultants are working on the project, for its shaping. One of the project consultants of the project, is the world-renowned consultancy group- PwC. PwC claims that they have hired the services of a third-party agency - Vision Tech who has deputed their staff to work for PwC in the project. Swapna was that resource person who joined Space Park as PwC’s representative as Operations manager.Now interestingly, PwC claims that she was recommended for this job by Kerala’s IT Secretary Shivasankar IAS and they recommended to Vision Tech to send her based on his recommendation. So as per PwC, they kept Swapna as Operations Manager (her designation legally was Marketing liaisoning officer) only on the basis of personal recommendation of IT Secretary of Kerala.Now Shivshankar IAS is not just IT Secretary of Kerala, but also CMO’s Principal Secretary and often hailed as the right hand of CM. And IT Department comes under CM’s portfolio. So the allegation against CMO by the opposition parties is that his office has recommended Swapna for this job in Space Park as an OUT-OF-THE-WAY appointment and facilitated her to be the part of the Govt system.Now that allegation is NOT linked to the Gold smuggling, as Opposition leader’s accusation is that, Swapna Suresh had linkages with many in Kerala Govt, thus used her influence to do her secret business. The allegation points the fingers to IT Secretary Shivasankar IAS as he appeared almost like a godfather to her. Because Shivasankar is close to Swapna Suresh, she could do many illicit things without being caught or noticed by the police.And since Shivasankar IAS was so close to CM, he drew much of his authority out of his closeness to the CM.Now, in no manner - CM or the CMO is directly linked to the scam.The original accusation was that Swapna Suresh was a contract employee of Govt’s Kerala IT Infrastructures Limited, which was the body that is developing Space Park. And to prove that, an image of Swapna’s KITIL Visiting card was circulated which also had Kerala Govt’s emblem (so that looked like she was a govt employee).It later found as a fake image, allegedly forged by her to gain authenticity. It was also revealed, Swapna wasn’t working for IT Department or any Govt bodies, but to a Private companyThe forged Visiting card of Swapna SureshThe accusation which the BJP State President Surendran made on 6th July 2020 was that - a call came from CMO’s office to Thiruvananthapuram Airport Customs Department to release the baggage on 5th July. Infact, this particular news became so wideshared across various media, including national media, thus many narratives/propoganda came into picture that CMO was directly involved in the case.But later on 7th July 2020, Thiruvananthapuram Airport Customs Department issued a statement that no calls were made by anyone from CMO over this, thus putting an end to that speculation.gold smuggling; no one has been called from cm office- Customs സ്വര്‍ണക്കടത്തുമായി ബന്ധപ്പെട്ട് മുഖ്യമന്ത്രിയുടെ ഓഫീസില്‍ നിന്ന് ആരും വിളിച്ചിട്ടില്ലെന്ന് കസ്റ്റംസ്Another accusation was that CM knew Swapna personally and photos were circulating in social media with Pinarayi Vijayan walking close with her or talking to her (something similar to Solar Scam accused Saritha Nair did with then - the CM of Kerala Shri Oommen Chandy). But it was revealed, the pics were taken during Iftar 2019 when Shri Pinarayi Vijayan was the guest of Honor at UAE consulate and guided by Swapna who was then-the Protocol officer of the Embassy (in her capacity of Consul General’s Executive Secretary)CM with Swapna Suresh and Consul General at the UAE Consulate- Thiruvananthapuram.And to break all allegations, Kerala CM Pinarayi wrote a letter to Prime Minister Modi seeking for faster investigation by any central agency and assuring state govt’s support for the same.So as of now, not much prima facia evidence exists to connect CM with the case.Then where CMO went wrong?I would say its primary with Shivasankar IASPinarayi Vijayan had lot of trust factor over his principal secretary- Shivasankar IAS. Infact Shivasankar IAS is one of the most respected bureaucrats in Kerala. He was the former Chairman of KSEB and was also a banking professional in Reserve Bank of India. He is a more of a technocrat than a bureaucrat (he got IAS thro’ conferred right) as he was actively into various IT/ITES projects. Shivasankar IAS was also a popular techno evangelist. He holds membership with various start up mentoring groups, well connected with techno venture capitalists, a visiting faculty in IIM -Ahmedabad, Kozhikode as well as IITs and IITM etc. So essentially he is not the typical file - looking rule book following bureaucrat.When Pinarayi came to power, he wanted lot of investments to happen in IT sector which was his portfolio and Pinarayi Vijayan isn’t the usual old fashioned communist. He is more of typical Chinese style pragmatic Communist which believes in Socialist Capitalism model and adherent believer in private capital and private investment (the root of famous ideological fight with the Puritans like VS fraction etc in Kerala CPM). So Pinarayi Vijayan found Shivasankar IAS as perfect choice to push for IT Investments due to his strong connections in IT corporate world.This is how Shivasankar IAS because IT Secretary and he really pushed Kerala IT in a big way. The high profile investment of Nissan Tech in Kerala, as well as establishment of India’s first FABLabs and rapid growth of startups by establishing India’s largest Startup facility- TIZ and many others were testimony of his contributions. And due to this factor, he gained unprecedented trust and access to CM, thus even becoming Principal Secretary of CMO overriding many others in the seniority. He was the man behind many ambitious projects of Pinarayi Vijayan like KFON (Kerala’s independent Fiber Optic network to make Internet universal access and right to all citizens), Kerala Space Park in support with ISRO (which is India’s first Space park for commercial production of space components and instruments), E-Bus manufacturing unit in Kochi, Kerala Laptops hub, Kochi-Bangalore Industrial corridor etc.But unlike other bureaucrats, Shivsankar wasn’t a rule-book following one. He worked more like a corporate, more like a private entrepreneur. And with full trust of CM, he rarely bothered to follow rules or manage things like how other bureaucrats did.In many cases, agreements with private companies were made on-the-spot without the usual govt process. The best example of recent times was Sprinkr case where he claimed he signed the agreement when he felt its all fine, keeping Finance department and other departments in dark. In many instances, his on-the-spot decisions has put govt in dock over the accusations of not following the due process of the law. But in last 4 years, CM protected him.In the Spinkr case, Shivasankar came to medias and openly bluffed that he thinks what he felt right and there is nothing wrong in that, which actually created a loss of face incident for the govt, as such is not the way a bureaucrat should behave. LDF as well as CPM itself expressed their concerns against the way the bureaucrat was working and CPI even made a public statement that he must be removed. But CM choose to protect then.The current accusation is that, Shivasankar did appoint the Smuggling case kingpin- Swapna Suresh in a govt department indirectly and she got him in many ways.Shivasankar IAS is a top bureaucrat and since he leads CMO, he had a huge powerful image beyond Chief Secretary. Infact, its indeed Pinarayi’s mistake to accord unrestricted power to a bureaucrat. And by doing so and not heeding to the party advice to limit him, Pinarayi indeed has to take a share of all blames caused by Shivasankar.Swapna Suresh has undue influence over Shivasankar IAS. Infact its thro’ his recommendation, PwC recommended her to the project team of one of the projects into which PwC is the consultant at Space Park. Technically its not a govt job or even a contract job under Govt, as she was hired by a private company as part of their space selling initiative in Space park and she was working within Space Park campus which was a govt entity. So she was more of an outsourced employee.Shivasankar IAS with Swapna Suresh and Sarith Nair.Shivasankar IAS with Swapna Suresh, Sarith Nair during an IT Department function.However, she was publicly claiming as a Govt employee and even had visiting cards with Govt emblem, which wasn’t flagged in the last few months by none. This can happen only if she got adequate cover from her god-father Shivasankar IAS directly who enjoys CM’s full trust (so indirectly even CM). Its very unusual that even intelligence bodies have ignored someone who claims to be a Govt employee in a highly controlled zone like Space Park which is a strategic institution as its partly owned by ISRO. This alone proves, she had protection.But interestingly, she did this Smuggling business not even under a misrepresented identity of being Kerala Govt employee.She did the smuggling business in her identity as an official of UAE consulate. She and her colleague were ex-employees but were using the forged ID cards of UAE consulate and smuggling via Diplomatic channel in their capacity as Consulate staff. And in last 10 incidents of clearing baggage, they used their identity as Consulate staff, not anything to link to Kerala Govt. This was also mentioned by her in her anticipatory bail application to Kerala High Court that she was acting as Executive secretary even after leaving the consulate on request of the Consul General.In Kerala Gold Smuggling Scandal, Woman Alleges UAE Diplomat's RoleKerala Gold Smuggling Case : Swapna Suresh Moves Kerala HC For Pre-Arrest Bail; Says 'No Connection With Smuggled Gold' [Read Application]Why Pinarayi needs to be blamed?As of current facts available, Pinarayi Vijayan isn’t linked with the actual Gold smuggling scam or benefits of the scam etc.But Pinarayi will be blamed for giving unfettered authority to Shivasankar IAS who in-return used his position to support Swapna Suresh, thereby allowing her to do her business freely without fear. She enjoyed his support.This was evident when Crime Branch has gone slow in a previous case against Swapna Suresh. Swapna Suresh was alleged to commit a fake complaint against another collegue of her during her days as ground staff of Air India Ground Handling in Thiruvananthapuram (this happened before she joined UAE consulate). That time, she made a fake complaint using name of another lady colleagues to get a male AI Staff arrested on grounds of molestation and abuse. But it was later discovered that the complaint itself was fake when that man went to High court and Crime Branch took the case to investigate in February 2019. Almost a year passed, no case proceedings happened, which means she had enough influence in the system to get cases go slowSo the entire accusation against Pinarayi lies on the fact that, Swapna Suresh or her accomplices, had some degree influence in the Kerala govt, which she may/may not, have used for her illegal activities.What Pinarayi Vijayan saysHe claims that he have no personal connection with Swapna Suresh. He doesn’t need to know who all are working in which all department under him. In this case, Swapna Suresh is not even a govt contracted employee, rather a private employee working in a govt project.He knows Swapna Suresh only as a UAE govt staff at consulate and being the protocol officer, she was the one who guided him and escorted him in the consulate.Shivasankar IAS has been removed from CMO as well as IT Secretary post due to the allegations of his connection with a prime accused of the case.Kerala Govt has nothing to do with Thiruvananthapuram Airport or any of its operations as airport, comes under Central Govt and it is the job of Central agencies like Customs and other departments like Immigration to ensure such crimes don’t happen.CMO has written to Govt of India to have a detailed investigation on the same by any central agency and govt of Kerala will support the sameWhat are current developments?Unlike in Hindi/English Mainstream news channels which are mostly Pro-Establishment (some works like propaganda channels- Godi Media), Malayalam Media/News are heavily Anti-Establishment. The role of Malayalam Media is always to criticize the govt in power and the media played a big role in finding lapses and shady areas of many scams that had then-the govt in power, be it Palm-oil case and ISRO Spy case (that rocked Karunakaran Govt and brought him down), Civil supplies scam that brought AK Antony down during the Narasimha Rao govt or the Ice Cream scandal that brought IUML’s powerful Kunjalikutty down or Saritha case that disgraced then - the CM Oommen Chandy. Same way it was malayalam Media that exposed SNC Lavalin case which made Pinarayi Vijayan to stay away from power for last 21 years and nearly 3 ministers in current LDF govt had to resign due to various scandal exposures. So the current one is indeed a potential area for Malayalam media to expose the failures of Pinarayi Vijayan Govt in controlling such characters. It is heavily celebrated in Malayalam media and the prime news of all channels and newspapers have moved to this topic.More news are coming out linking other opposition parties into this deal. One of the prime accused- Suresh Nair is alleged to be closely associated with BJP and he was the driver of a BJP Councillor in Thiruvananthapuram Corporation before becoming rich overnight. He also have many pictures in his FB showing his closeness with top leaders of Kerala BJP unit. This has put Kerala state BJP in a fix and other fact - a top BMS leader has been directly involved in the scam by calling customs and showing his interest in releasing the baggage.Another fact - Swapna Suresh herself was close to a former Congress Minister- KC Venugopal who is Rahul Gandhi’s lieutenant. Its alleged that Swapna Suresh got job in Air India Ground Handling when KC Venugopal was MoS of Civil Aviation in India and later it was thro’ him she got job in Consulate. This also puts Congress into the the radar.The actual case has direct international implications as all evidences shows the trio worked directly for the Consul General and many Emirati Officials both in Thiruvananthapuram and in Dubai, knew about this activity. If not, there is no need for Emirati Attache to personally visit airport and seek release. This has put UAE also in dock, as it looks like UAE diplomats were too involved in this same racket.There are other hints coming up - UNCONFIRMED news that these gold were channelized for funding some sleeper cells of ISIS in South India. Its based on this account- NIA has taken up the case. That complicates the whole case itself.So indeed, Kerala is seeing a major case, almost on likes of ISRO Spy case that has a widespread international ramifications.But as of now, CMO isn’t directly involved into the case.Further readingKerala gold smuggling case explained: Diplomatic cargo, an absconding woman and a consulate under scannerWas UAE Consulate officer right in using Sarith for ‘odd jobs’: Former diplomats weigh inShe last travelled to Dubai before lockdownTop Kerala IAS officer removed for links with woman behind UAE gold 'smuggling ring'Gold smuggling: Did Sandeep, Swapna Suresh flee together?Swapna Suresh's alleged links with PwC; company issues clarification

Monopoly or not, they stopped American aviation advances by their constant litigation .Were the Wright brothers famous for anything else besides the airplane?The Bishop’s Boys: More sinned against than sinners?Many have critiqued the Wrights’ business practices and marketing strategies in the post-1903 years.But the Wright brothers would certainly not be the first—or the last—entrepreneurs or inventors to prove better at inventing than managing or marketing.Dec 18, 1903It was a beautiful, wonderful, watershed moment, and one that’s the focus of most of the centennial of flight celebrations this year.But what happened after that?Like the famous fairy tale ending “and they lived happily ever after,” most stories of the Wright brothers end on December 17, 1903.And yet, just as with any true-life romance, there’s a lot more to the tale.The Wright brothers’ famous 12-second flight was clearly only a rudimentary starting point for this new industry and world.What happened on December 18, 1903?Or, for that matter, between that first flight and 1915, when Orville Wright sold his interest in the Wright Company?In 1903, the Wright brothers were world leaders in understanding and solving the problems of flight.So why, by 1914, were only 23 of the world’s 3,700 airplanes U.S.-owned?The answers to those questions are part of a fascinating—and surprisingly controversial—story that involves personalities, politics, blackmail, family feuds, hardball legal battles, and a vast difference in governmental support for aviation on the two sides of the Atlantic.The Wright brothers had no sooner packed up their wind-damaged 1903 Flyer and returned to Dayton for Christmas then they got their first letter threatening legal action unless they agreed to share credit and profits from their new invention.The letter was written by Augustus Herring, who had accompanied the Wrights’ friend and fellow aeronautical experimenter Octave Chanute to Kitty Hawk in 1902.After seeing the Wright brothers’ glider in flight, Herring had rushed to modify his own glider patent application to incorporate some of the Wrights’ design innovations.The patent application for Herring’s unsuccessful glider was denied.But if the Wright brothers needed any warning about the business perils that loomed before them, Herring’s letter provided it.In January 1904, the brothers hired a patent attorney.For the next two years, Orville and Wilbur tried to keep their experiments as private as possible while they worked on developing the unstable 1903 Flyer into a practical flying machine.They also submitted a patent application for what they considered the most significant and protectable aspect of their design—their three-axis control system.They didn’t just patent their wing-warping technique. They applied for a patent to cover any three-axis aircraft control that involved changing the camber of the wing.By 1905, Wilbur and Orville decided that they had finally developed a marketable product.So they did what anyone would expect an inventor/entrepreneur to do: they stopped flying and locked the prototype away in a shed.Even after the patent was awarded in 1906, the Wrights still kept the plane locked away.The reason was that they’d decided that they really didn’t want to go into the airplane manufacturing business.They wanted to sell not only the plane but all the secrets that had made it possible, to someone who could pay them enough in a lump sum for the package that the brothers could then devote themselves completely to research.The Wright brothers knew that the most likely customers for that kind of purchase were governments, so they pursued a contract first with the U.S. government, and then, when that contract seemed unattainable, with governments in Europe.But Wilbur and Orville had two stipulations for any negotiations that gave many potential customers pause.First, they started out asking $250,000 for the package, which was a high sum for even a government to pay.If government representatives had seen what the Wrights’ 1905 Flyer could do, however, they might have agreed to that price.The problem was that the Wrights also refused to demonstrate the aircraft until a customer signed a purchase contract (dependent on a flight demonstration that met with the customer’s approval) and put a down payment in escrow.To the Wrights, it seemed a perfectly reasonable arrangement.What they did not understand was how much skepticism still remained about their achievement or even the possibility of flight.The Wrights also refused to budge on their requirements because they figured they were years ahead of anyone else in the field, and they could afford to wait for the perfect offer.In this assumption, they were only partially correct.On both sides of the Atlantic, enthusiastic aeronautical experimenters were all working on pieces of the problem, with varying degrees of success.The Wrights were, in fact, at least four or five years ahead of the pack.But as time went by and the Wrights still hadn’t obtained the government contracts they wanted, the competition was beginning to catch up.In 1907, Alexander Graham Bell, who had been interested in the problems of flight for a number of years, sponsored the formation of the Aerial Experiment Association, with the goal of conducting flight experiments and developing practical flying machines.One of the five members of the group was a motorcycle builder and racer named Glenn Curtiss.▲Casey Baldwin, Lt. Thomas Selfridge, Glenn Curtiss, Alexander Graham Bell and John McCurdy formed the Aerial Experiment Association to promote development of a practical flying machine in 1907.By late May of 1908, the group had flown its first truly successful design—a fragile craft called the White Wing.In July, Curtiss followed with a successful design of his own, called the June Bug.On July 4, 1908, Curtiss won his first aviation prize—the Scientific American Trophy-for flying the June Bug a full kilometer.The Wrights could have won the Scientific American prize as soon as it was announced in the fall of 1907. In fact, the Aero Club of America, which sanctioned the challenge, fully expected the Wright brothers to take the trophy.But the Wrights weren’t interested in prizes and competitions.They were also busy in the spring of 1908, preparing for flight demonstrations to fulfill two smaller contracts they’d finally negotiated—one with the U.S. Army, and one with a business consortium in France.But they still took enough note of Curtiss’s achievement to notify him immediately afterward that his airplane design was an infringement on their 1906 patent—and that while he was welcome to fly his plane in exhibitions, they would sue him if he attempted to sell or produce it.Curtiss and Bell were aware of the Wright brothers’ patent.But they thought they could circumvent its strictures by utilizing something other than wing warping to achieve three-axis control.The device they chose was a small moveable “wing” that could be positioned between the upper and lower wings, or at the outer tips of the wings, to increase or decrease the wing’s camber and lift.The device was the brainchild of a French aeronautical experimenter named Robert Esnault-Pelterie, although Esnault-Pelterie had never been able to successfully implement his “little wing,” or aileron.on June 26, 1909, Glenn Curtiss sold his first aileron-equipped airplane.▲In this replica of the Curtiss Pusher you can see the "middle wing" that provided roll control without wing warping, but still infringed on the Wrights' patent on three-axis control.The Wrights sued.It was the beginning of an angry and drawn-out patent war that would last eight long years and cause enmity between the Wright and Curtiss camps that long outlived any of the original players.Curtiss continued his exhibition flying and aircraft development and sales, winning the 1909 Gordon Bennett Cup in Paris and electrifying crowds with the possibilities of aviation.The Wright brothers had the right to produce as many aircraft as they wanted, but they performed limited flight exhibitions and spent much of their time trying to negotiate larger contracts and fighting Curtiss (and others) in court.Focused on court battles and servicing their existing contracts, the Wrights didn’t have time to do a lot of research or development for their aircraft designs.And then, in 1912, Wilbur Wright died of typhoid fever.In 1914, the courts gave a final ruling in favor of the Wright brothers, saying that their three-axis control system patent was a “pioneer” invention deserving the broadest interpretation and protection possible.Orville Wright agreed to let other entities manufacture airplanes as long as they paid the Wright Company a 20 percent royalty.Other entities, that is, except Glenn Curtiss.Curtiss responded with a unique counterattack.Two months before the Wright brothers had flown in 1903, Samuel Langley, who was the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, had attempted to flight test his own aircraft design.Launched off a houseboat in the Potomac on two separate occasions in the fall of 1903, Langley’s Aerodrome was a dismal failure.Langley had always maintained that the failure was due to a launch mechanism problem, not anything inherently wrong with the machine.So after the 1914 court ruling, Curtiss pulled Langley’s Aerodrome out of storage with the goal of restoring it and proving that it was, indeed, capable of flight.Why would Curtiss want to do that?There are numerous theories.But it is true that if Curtiss could prove that the Wrights were not the first inventors of the airplane, it might undermine the "pioneer" status of their patent, and the broad protection the courts had granted the brothers because of that status.What happened next sparked an even bigger controversy in the annals of history.Everyone agrees that Curtiss modified the original Aerodrome as he restored the 11-year-old machine.The question is how significant those modifications were.After an initial restoration and modification period, which included strengthening the wings and adding pontoons, Curtiss did manage to get the Aerodrome to fly, although it still lacked three-axis control.Its stability came only from a dihedral configuration of its wings.Curtiss then added new engines and more extensive modifications which, not surprisingly, improved the Aerodrome’s performance.Curtiss’s efforts didn’t impact his fortunes in court.But the Smithsonian proudly announced that while the Wright brothers were the first to fly an airplane, Langley had, in fact, been the first to invent an aircraft capable of flight.Orville was so incensed that he refused to give the Smithsonian the 1903 Flyer for its collection, finally sending the reconstructed aircraft to the London Museum of Science in 1928, where it stayed until after Orville’s death in 1948.It was 1942 before the Smithsonian finally acknowledged that it had been Wilbur and Orville Wright, not Samuel Langley, who’d invented the airplane.The legal struggles between the Wrights and Curtiss dragged on until 1917 when the U.S. government finally intervened.With the nation on the brink of war, a manufacturer’s aircraft association was formed, creating a patent pool that allowed for cross-licensing of both the Wrights’ and Curtiss’s various patents.Orville Wright had sold the Wright Company in 1915.But as the primary patent holders, the reorganized Wright-Martin company and the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company each received $2 million as part of the agreement.The Wright brothers may have invented the airplane and won the court battle to protect that invention.But it’s a matter of opinion as to whether, in the end, they won or lost the war.By 1918, the Curtiss JN-4 Jenny was the most prevalent and well-known American aircraft in the skies.And in an even more ironic twist, the adversarial Wright and Curtiss companies actually merged in 1929, forming the Curtiss-Wright airplane and engine company.Interestingly enough, Glenn Curtiss had made a visit to the Wright’s shop in 1906 to propose just such a merger.Curtiss was already well-known for his engines, and he offered to join forces with the Wrights, providing the powerplants for the brothers’ airplane designs.While Curtiss and the Wrights had very different personalities and business approaches, the men actually had many things in common.Like the Wrights, Curtiss was a bicycle designer and racer who’d developed a passionate and consuming interest in flight.So...who knows?While the brothers’ stubborn approach to business, patents and lawsuits might have created a lot of potentially unnecessary controversy and damaged their own marketing and further research prospects, the Curtiss-Wright patent wars weren’t the primary reason why America fell so far behind Europe in post-1909 aircraft development and manufacturing.There was also a big difference in investment between the European governments, who saw war looming on the horizon, and the more complacent U.S government.It wasn’t until the formation of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA, the predecessor of NASA) in 1915 and the $4 million Curtiss-Wright patent settlement of 1917 that the U.S. government began to invest seriously in the development of aeronautics and aviation.PostscriptThe Wright Flyer designs did not, in the end, become the standard configuration for aircraft built after 1910.Other aircraft designs—including Curtiss’s, and Louis Bleriot’s Bleriot XI—soon eclipsed the Wright flying machines.▲Glenn Curtiss in his June Bug

You are an about-to-be engineer, you should expect an engineering answer, and some homework!The simple answer is none. Neither in the military (as well as is known) nor in civil operation.▲Damn! Even Burt Rutan, no respecter of symmetry, designed this symmetrical White Knight for Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic.▼ What the deuce! Even Spaceship Two, which is being carried aloft by White Knight, is symmetrical!But not for lack of trying!A Summary Of A Half-Century of Oblique Wing ResearchLet’s have a discussion on NASA’s AD-1 — or Ames-Dryden-1 .Let’s talk design.▲One of legendary American aerospace designer Burt Rutan's lesser known works, the NASA AD-1 was built to test NASA engineer Robert Jones' oblique wing concept that promised both good low speed handling qualities and low drag at high speed. The NASA AD-1 was both an aircraft and an associated flight test program conducted between 1979 and 1982. Image courtesy NASA.The following story regarding the AD-1 Oblique Wing Research Aircraft was sent to me by a friend, a design engineer, who wrote it during May 1987.A few years ago the powers that be allocated half a million dollars for the construction of the AD-1, a so-called scissors-wing airplane intended to test a simplified kind of variable wing sweep. The entire wing of the AD-1 pivoted with respect to the fuselage, producing a weird-looking unsymmetrical X-shaped airplane.The usual way of assessing the flying qualities of a concept like this is with a large radio-controlled model.But the skewed wing gave its radio-pilot such confusing visual cues—you couldn’t tell whether it was banked or not, and if so, which way—that a manned version was needed.It’s said that the only reason the AD-1 was allocated the money was that somebody important thought it was going to be a drone; nobody had ever heard of a manned jet prototype costing only $500,000.The project turned out to be a fateful one in aviation history, however, not because of what it revealed about skewed wings but because it launched a civilian skunk works, Scaled Composites, which has produced a stream of innovative airplanes, including the Beech Starship.(Who’s the boss of Scaled Composites? Burt Rutan!)The AD-1 flew more than 100 hours at NASA’s Dryden Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base before it was retired. It is now emerging from mothballs to be rewinged and to test another unusual wing configuration that might be confusing to a ground-based radio controller: the joined wing.▲ NASA JW-1 Joint Wing Radio-Controlled aircraftThe joined wing is the brainchild of Julian Wolkovitch, a British-born aeronautical engineer who has a consulting firm, ACA Industries, near Los Angeles.Wolkovitch has been pushing the joined-wing idea (which shares his initials) quite hard for more than 10 years, proposing it for a number of applications including cruise missiles, business jets and airliners.A large radio-controlled model and a couple of ultralights using the joined-wing arrangement have been flown; the rework of the AD-1 will represent the first embodiment of the joined wing in a relatively high-performance manned airplane.A joined wing is a diamond-shaped arrangement of tandem flying surfaces.Typically, the forewing sprouts from low on the forward fuselage with quite a bit of sweep and dihedral; the aft wing, with marked anhedral and forward sweep, is secured to the top of the vertical tail and to the forward wing either at or well inboard from the tips.Wolkovitch has many arguments in support of this configuration.The essential ones are inherent structural rigidity, and the ability to display the low induced drag and high resistance to stalling of a well-designed canard.The structural argument is fundamental.The slender, high-aspect-ratio wing of an efficient airplane makes a poor beam; the ratio of its thickness to its cantilevered length is necessarily very small. Reinforcing struts are a possible remedy but, because of their drag, they have not found favor in high-performance airplanes.Instead, wings are simply built with beefy internal structures to achieve adequate strength and stiffness. (Stiffness, which is resistance to bending, is as important in wing design as strength, which is resistance to breaking.)If, however, a rear wing is brought forward to join a swept front wing, each wing acts as a strut for the other.Cantilever bending loads are largely converted into compression and tension reacted by the entire structure of each wing, while the remaining bending loads between the fuselage and the wing joint are reduced to a fraction of their usual values.The entire wing system can therefore weigh less than a single cantilever wing of like area and aspect ratio. Weight reductions are meaningful, however, only if they are not accompanied by increases in drag.Wolkovitch argues that the forward position of the front wing root on the fuselage is beneficial; it avoids the risk of separation that is present when the wing meets the body as the body converges.For the naturally difficult double intersection of the vertical fin and the rear wing he proposes simply a "bullet" fairing of the type that many T tails have.He claims a large reduction in induced drag, due to the favorable interactions of the flow fields of the two wings.If he is right, then the joined-wing configuration is a serendipitous discovery indeed.Interactions at the wing joint are a matter of dispute, however.Though Wolkovitch says that both wind tunnel and computer studies support his contention that joined wings reduce induced drag, others don’t agree.The Predator agplane, developed by Scaled Composites for a private entrepreneur, David Record, began as a joined-wing design.The reasoning was that an agplane needs an unusually large wingspan in order to lay as wide a swath as possible; but at the same time it operates in a particularly rough-and-tumble aerial environment.A wing that combined high aspect ratio with unusual stiffness looked like the right choice.Agplanes crash a lot; in this design, the pilot sat near the back end of the fuselage entirely surrounded by massive wing and fin structures.The eventual design of the Predator prototype did not incorporate the joined wing.The designer says that it was abandoned because of unpromising results in wind-tunnel tests and because a weight analysis indicated that penalties associated with the wing joint itself—the wings must not overlap, but must be joined through a small, highly stressed fore-aft body—cancelled gains from the mutual bracing of the two wings.Wolkovitch has said that the reason was that the designer didn’t want to pay for rights to his patented configuration.The aerodynamic difficulties of the original Predator had to do with longitudinal and directional stability. Directional stability suffered because of massive separation in the junction between the vertical fin and the rear wing; this problem may have been specific to the Predator, whose vertical fin doubled as a cabin and so was unusually thick.More unsettling was the longitudinal behavior of the model. The portion of each wing that is close to the wing joint operates in a distorted flow field produced by its neighbour.Wolkovitch recognizes this fact and alters the shape of his airfoils accordingly. The problem that surfaced in the Predator was that the wing flow fields changed continually with angle of attack, and with them the longitudinal stability.According to the designer, there was "no linearity anywhere."It may be that the problems encountered with the Predator design were not unsolvable.Pure research and business R&D are different things, and the joined-wing version of the Predator was abandoned because it seemed to entail too great a technological risk for a start-up company.The modification of the AD-1, on the other hand, is a matter of pure research. It’s Wolkovitch’s opportunity—a rare one that many innovators might envy—to prove objectively that what he’s been saying about joined wings for all these years is true.The ball is in Wolkovitch’s court, and NASA is paying him to play it. For joined wings, it’s now or never. ❑Oh, by the way, Burt Rutan has retired. The US National Aeronautic Association (NAA) named aircraft designer and composites pioneer Burt Rutan as its 2015 recipient of the NAA Wright Brothers Memorial Trophy. Established by NAA in 1948 to honour the memory of Orville and Wilbur Wright, the trophy is awarded annually to a living American for “significant public service of enduring value to aviation in the United States”.Can you be next to take his place?It’s a tall order!