On this day in aviation history, January 22, 1926, an aircraft called Plus Ultra set off to become the first aircraft to fly from Spain to Argentina. This event was not only a momentous event in the history of aviation as a whole, but it was also politically important for the Kingdom of Spain and the Argentine Republic, which were now connected by air for the first time in history.
In the Royal Spanish coat of arms, Plus Ultra is Latin for “Forward beyond”, which was adopted by Holy Roman Emperor Charles V after the discovery of the Americas. In 1922, the first crossing of the South Atlantic had been completed by Portuguese naval aviators Gago Coutinho and Sacadura Cabral from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro (then the capital of Brazil) to celebrate Brazil’s independence centenary. Inspired by this, the Spanish government decided to sponsor a flight from Spain to Argentina as part of its efforts to connect its former colonies by air.
The aircraft chosen for this flight was a Dornier Do J “Wal” (Whale), a flying boat designed in Germany by Claude Dornier and first flown in 1922. The Wal was one of the most successful flying boat designs of the 1920s, as its rugged all-metal design made it suitable for operations in even some of the world’s most remote regions, and its overhead twin-engine push-pull configuration would be used on later Dornier flying boats up to the 1940s.
As the Weimar Republic was still under heavy restrictions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles, German aircraft designers such as Dornier often built airplanes outside Germany, and the Dornier Do J Wal of this story was an example of this, being constructed by Dornier’s Italian subsidiary, Costruzioni Meccaniche Aeronautiche Società Anonima (Aeronautical Mechanical Constructions Limited Company) in Marina di Pisa as construction number 40, and was delivered to the Spanish Navy. Though Dornier Wals flew with a variety of engines, this particular Wal was powered with a pair of Napier Lion W-12 water-cooled inline engines, a 12-cylinder engine with three banks of four cylinders as opposed to a V-12 with two rows of six cylinders.
The crew of the Plus Ultra consisted of four Spanish flight officers: Commander Ramón Franco, (the younger brother of future Generalissimo Francisco Franco), Captain Julio Ruiz de Alda (later a co-founder of the Spanish Falange), Lieutenant Juan Manuel Durán, and mechanical corporal Pablo Rada. Before beginning their flight across the Atlantic, the aircraft was issued the Spanish civil registration M-MWAL and inscribed with the name Plus Ultra. The Spanish aviators planned to retrace the route taken by Coutinho and Cabral to Rio before proceeding further along the South American coast to Buenos Aires.
On the morning of January 22, 1926, the Plus Ultra set off on its epic journey, taking off from Palos de la Frontera, the very port from which Christopher Columbus’ fleet of three ships (the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria) had departed on their fateful voyage to the New World on August 3, 1492. For 8 hours, they flew over 1,300 kilometers (808 miles) to Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, in the Canary Islands. Four days later, on January 26, they departed the Canary Islands and flew 1,745 kilometers (1,084 miles) to Praia, Cape Verde. Ahead of them lay the longest stretch of their voyage, from the Old World to the New.
When the Plus Ultra set off from Praia across the Atlantic on January 31, the crew had intended to land at Recife, Brazil, and had a radio direction finder to help navigate their way towards radio signals from South America. However, although they had made it across the Atlantic, a lack of fuel forced them to land at the archipelago of Fernando de Noronha, covering 2,305 kilometers (1,432 miles) in the process. After refueling there, they proceeded to Recife, before arriving at Rio de Janeiro on February 4, after a 12-hour, 15-minute flight. Though this was cause for celebration when they arrived in the-then capital city of Brazil, they had two more stages of their flight left.
On February 9, 1926, the Plus Ultra flew from Rio de Janeiro to Montevideo, Uruguay, another 12-hour flight for its crew as they traveled south down the Brazilian and Uruguayan coasts. Again, they were celebrated as heroes, but in just one day, they would complete their flight when they arrived in Buenos Aires on February 10 to the jubilation of the Spanish-speaking world, and when the crew had returned to Spain, they were greeted with honors by King Alfonso XIII. However, the King had decided that the airplane that made the journey, the Plus Ultra, was to remain in Argentina, where it was offered to and accepted by the Argentine government, who used the aircraft to carry mail across the country.
As for the crew of the Plus Ultra, Juan Manuel Durán was killed only five months later in a plane crash near Barcelona, while Julio Ruiz de Alda helped found the Falange fascist party and was later imprisoned in 1936 shortly before the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, where he was executed by Spanish anarchists in Madrid’s Modelo prison. Ramón Franco would join his brother Francisco but was killed in the crash of a floatplane bomber he was flying during the Spanish Civil War in 1938. The last surviving member of the Plus Ultra crew, Pablo Rada, whose modest background made him a hero among the Spanish working class, had fought for the Second Spanish Republic during the civil war, and upon the fall of the Republic and the victory of Francisco Franco’s Nationalists, Rada lived in exile in Colombia and Venezuela before returning to Spain in 1969 with Franco’s permission, dying a few months after his arrival in Madrid.
As for the Plus Ultra airplane, it was later set aside for preservation and is currently displayed in the “Enrique Udaondo” Provincial Museum Complex in Luján, just outside Buenos Aires. In 1985, it was returned to Spain for restoration, with the idea of recreating the 1926 flight was proposed, but given the condition of the aircraft, it was ultimately restored for static display to be returned back to Luján, where it remains today, though a full-scale replica was constructed in 1992 for the Museo del Aeronáutica y Astronáutica (Museum of Aeronautics and Astronautics) in Madrid.
While the flight of the Plus Ultra is not as remembered as other flights, it is important to recognize lesser-known flights such as that of the Plus Ultra to maintain the wider history of aviation during the period between the two World Wars.
Today in Aviation History is a series highlighting the achievements, innovations, and milestones that have shaped the skies. All the previous anniversaries are available HERE