Blériot XII

The Blériot XII was an early French aeroplane built by Louis Blériot and first flown in May 1909. It was a high-wing tractor monoplane with a deep uncovered fuselage, the pilot and passenger sitting between the upper and lower longerons, and lateral control by two ailerons mounted on the lower longerons. The prototype first used a 40 hp E.N.V. water-cooled engine driving a propeller by chain. On 12 June 1909 it became the first aircraft to fly with three people aboard, one of them Alberto Santos-Dumont. At Reims Blériot came second in the 1909 Gordon Bennett Cup behind Glenn Curtiss and set a 10 km lap speed record of 77 km/h, but the prototype stalled, crashed and burned the next day. A later example sold to Claude Grahame-White became the British War Office aircraft nicknamed The Man-Killer.