1981 in aviation

This is a list of aviation-related events from 1981. The deadliest crash of this year was Inex-Adria Aviopromet Flight 1308, a McDonnell Douglas MD-81 which crashed into mountainous terrain on the island of Corsica, France on 1 December, killing all 180 people on board. January 7 – A Boeing 747 of CAAC lands at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, marking the first flight from the mainland of China to the United States since 1949. January 11–13 – Max Anderson and Don Ida make a failed attempt to circumnavigate the world by balloon, although their craft, the Jules Verne, makes a flight of from Luxor, Egypt, to New Delhi, India, in 48 hours before they give up. January 25 – Bell Helicopter delivers its 25,000th production helicopter, a Bell 222 to Omniflight Helicopters. January 26 – Pan American World Airways makes its final Boeing 707 service. January 28 – Pan Am commences a weekly New York-Beijing service. February 1 – American aircraft industrialist Donald Douglas, founder of the Douglas Aircraft Company, dies at the age of 88. February 7 – Taking off with a center of gravity that is beyond certified limits thanks to improperly seated passengers and poorly secured cargo that shifts, a Soviet Navy Tupolev Tu-104A (NATO reporting name "Camel") rolls inverted and crashes immediately after takeoff from Pushkin Airport south of Leningrad in the Soviet Union's Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic, killing all 51 people on board. Some of the dead are high-ranking Soviet Navy officials returning to Vladivostok after visiting Leningrad for a naval exercise. February 10 - An Aerolineas plane from Argentina to John F Kennedy airport came very close to crashing into the World Trade Centre towers. An alert air traffic controller saw that the plane had dropped to a lower altitude while on finals. He ordered the plane to turn so that it wouldn't smash into the buildings. February 12–14 – The American balloonists Maxie Anderson and Don Ida attempt a round-the-world balloon flight, setting off from Luxor, Egypt in the helium balloon Jules Verne on February 12, and landing east of New Delhi, India after a flight of .