In Osasco, then a district of S\u00e3o Paulo, an airplane named after the city, designed and built by the Spanish-born Brazilian industrialist Dimitri Sensaud de Lavaud (1882\u20131947) and Italian mechanic Louren\u00e7o de Pellegatti (1891\u20131976), similar in design to the French Bl\u00e9riot monoplane, and fitted with a French engine, had successfully taken flight in 1910.<\/p>\n
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Personal archive of Denizar Villela \/ Thyrso Villela Neto<\/span><\/a> Villela J\u00fanior as a reserve general, in 1929Personal archive of Denizar Villela \/ Thyrso Villela Neto<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n In 1914, Brazilian Eduardo Pacheco Chaves (1887\u20131975) completed the first nonstop flight between S\u00e3o Paulo and Rio in six and a half hours, aboard a Bl\u00e9riot. But these, unlike Villela J\u00fanior\u2019s project, were isolated and independent initiatives.<\/p>\n In 1912, he presented his design to the war minister, Vespasiano Gon\u00e7alves de Albuquerque e Silva (1852\u20131924), hoping to secure funding. He was unsuccessful, but not defeated. He mortgaged his house and began testing locally available timber to make propellers, on a property in Realengo. At a factory in Sapopemba, the present-day district of Deodoro, he developed a high-strength cotton fabric to cover the fuselage; he also formulated the varnish used to coat the plane. \u201cHe made everything himself,\u201d says his great-grandson, Villela Neto. In his earlier work in aviation, he rebuilt a Bl\u00e9riot and installed a propeller that he had made on a navy airplane used for aerial recognizance.<\/p>\n An article published in the newspaper A Noite<\/em> on July 24, 1914, under the headline \u201cBrazilian officer introduces extensive aircraft modifications, creates entirely new aircraft,\u201d described a number of his innovations, which included shortening and vertically enlarging the fuselage\u2014the airplane\u2019s body\u2014to reduce roll and improve stability, and positioning the pilot seat below the wings for increased visibility. The wing spar was curved and a third of the wing was flapped to facilitate maneuvering and prevent skidding. His design seated three crew members (the pilot, an observer, and a mechanic or gunner) and featured side pockets for ammunitions.<\/p>\n The first prototype, made of Ingarana wood (Abarema jupunba<\/em>), was christened Aribu, a name resembling the Portuguese word for buzzard (urubu<\/em>)\u2014the aircraft\u2019s builder said he enjoyed watching buzzards fly as a child. Measuring 4.8 meters (m) in length, 8.4 m in wingspan, and 2.4 m in height, the Aribu was powered by a French 5-cylinder, 50-horsepower rotary engine. It made its maiden flight on April 16, 1917 in a field in Santa Cruz, flown by Lieutenant Raul Vieira de Mello (1884\u20131936), who also drafted the plans for the plane. The successful flight won Villela J\u00fanior support from the new war minister, General Jos\u00e9 Caetano de Faria (1855\u20131936). He was given access to Army facilities and equipment, and soon built the Alagoas, which Villela Neto estimates was larger than the Aribu.<\/p>\n On the morning of November 11, 1918, as Europe was celebrating the end of World War I, the Alagoas completed three trouble-free flights\u2014two with Mello and one with Villela J\u00fanior himself as pilot\u2014reaching a height of 800 m over Campo dos Afonsos. After the first flight, the war minister hugged Mello enthusiastically and congratulated Villela, saying he was \u201cglad to have found the solution to the aviation problem among our own,\u201d as reported by the daily Correio da Manh\u00e3<\/em> the following day. In an internal memorandum, the minister celebrated \u201cthe thorough success\u201d of the plane, \u201cthe development of which was accomplished with national capabilities, with the exception only of the engine.\u201d But even today, major aircraft manufacturers such as Boeing, Airbus, and Embraer prefer to source their engines from suppliers such as GE Aviation, an operating unit of General Electric, and Pratt & Whitney.<\/p>\n Gerson Pinto da Silva Souto. Personal archive of Denizar Villela \/Thyrso Villela Neto<\/span><\/a> Villela J\u00fanior (left, in uniform<\/em>) with his back to a Bl\u00e9riot, and opposite him the Aribu (right<\/em>), just before takeoffGerson Pinto da Silva Souto. Personal archive of Denizar Villela \/Thyrso Villela Neto<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n \u201cThe Alagoas was the first biplane [with two wings stacked one above the other] built in Brazil,\u201d Villela Neto wrote in an article in the July\u2013December 2017 issue of the magazine Parcerias Estrat\u00e9gicas<\/em>. The flight of the Alagoas lent credibility to ambitions to build aircraft locally in Brazil and create an independent military branch for aerial warfare, which would later become the Air Force, as Villela J\u00fanior had advocated since 1916 in articles published in the magazine A Defesa Nacional<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Army deployed the two planes as trainers at the Military Aviation School, which was founded in 1919,\u201d says Sales, who explored Villela J\u00fanior\u2019s work in a 2011 article in the magazine Revista UNIFA,<\/em> of the University of the Air Force. \u201cBut despite the Army’s support, the project was ultimately abandoned. Brazil missed a golden opportunity to develop a thriving aerospace industry in those early years, with Brigadier Villela at the helm.\u201d The government chose instead to buy French and English aircraft used in World War I, rather than investing in a home-grown program.<\/p>\n Based on historical documents and research, Sales discovered that the Aribu was lost to an accidental fire. In 1921, Villela J\u00fanior had just received praise from the officials of a French mission that was assisting the Brazilian Army, when the next morning the Alagoas was found burned to a hulk in a closed hangar where it had been left overnight, without fuel. Around that time, according to his biography in the book Canudos, mem\u00f3rias de um combatente<\/em> (Canudos, memoirs of a soldier), he built a scale model airplane for take-off and landing only, with a small engine, flexible wings, and a prototype spiral propeller.<\/p>\n Villela J\u00fanior was later transferred to the Reserve as a general. Following his advocacy for the incorporation of aviation by the Brazilian Army, in 1927 aviation was recognized as a fifth combat arm alongside infantry, artillery, engineering, and cavalry. In 1941, with the creation of the Air Force, he was promoted to brigadier general, though still remaining in the Reserve.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/090-093_Memoria_284-0-1140px-1.jpg\")
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