Aviator Wiley Post takes off to break world record

On July 23, 1933: Wiley Post completed a solo flight around the world in the Lockheed 5C Vega Winnie Mae. This record-breaking flight demonstrated several significant aviation technologies. It used two relatively new aeronautical devices—an autopilot and a radio direction finder.

The autopilot corrected for errors in aeronautical bearing, keeping the aircraft on course.

The radio direction finder helped Post navigate the aircraft toward specific radio transmitters along the route.

Although the flight was interrupted because Post had to repair the gyroscope and a bent propeller, he set a record of seven days, 18 hours, and 49 minutes, bettering his previous around-the-world record of eight days, also set in the Winnie Mae in 1931, with navigator Harold Gatty. That flight had begun on June 23 and ended on July 1; it covered 15,474 miles. It broke the record previously held by the airship Graf Zeppelin of twenty days, four hours set in 1929.