Ancient Flying Machines

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Introduction

Flight has been the dream of humankind since they watched in awe as birds soared effortlessly through the sky. But, according to accepted history, it wasn't until the 1780s that two Frenchmen achieved lighter-than-air flight when they were lifted into the air in a hot air balloon near Paris. Then powered, heavier-than-air flight became the goal. And although it was theorized that heavier-than-air flight was possible as early as the 13th century, and in the 16th century Leonardo da Vinci designed winged aircraft and a crude kind of helicopter, it wasn't until the Wright brothers made their first successful flights at Kitty Hawk in 1903 that powered flight became a reality.

That's the widely accepted history. Some researchers and a few rogue scientists believe there's evidence to suggest that humans achieved flight earlier in history - much earlier... so early, they say, that the knowledge of this technology has been lost and ancient stories that recount adventures of human flight have been relegated only to myth.

Is it possible that humans developed the technology to fly in early civilizations - or in civilizations that are now lost to history? Let's take a look at what some call the evidence - intriguing artifacts, carvings, inscriptions and legends - that they say point to the true record human of flight.

Colombia

Airplane Models

©1996 Lumir G. Janku. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

This object (shown in sketch) was found in 1898 in a tomb at Saqquara, Egypt and was later dated as having been created near 200 BCE. As airplanes were unknown in the days when it was found, it was thrown into a box marked "wooden bird model" and then stored in the basement of the Cairo museum.

It was rediscovered by Dr. Khalil Messiha, who studied models made by ancients. The "discovery" was considered so important by the Egyptian government that a special committee of leading scientists was established to study the object. 

As a result of their findings, a special exhibit was set up in the center hall of the Cairo museum, with the little model as its centerpiece. It was even labelled as a model airplane.

To elucidate the reasons for the decision of the committee, almost unprecedented in the field of archeology, let's consider some aspects of the model. The model has the exact proportions of a very advanced form of "pusher-glider" that is still having "some bugs ironed out". This type of glider will stay in the air almost by itself—even a very small engine will keep it going at low speeds, as low as 45 to 65 mph., while it can carry an enormous payload. This ability is dependent on the curious shape of wings and their proportions. The tipping of wings downward, a reversedihedral wing as it is called, is the feature behind this capability. A similar type of curving wings are implemented on the Concorde airplane, giving the plane a maximum lift without detracting from its speed.

In that context, it seems rather incredible that someone, more than 2,000 years ago, for any reason, devised a model of a flying device with such advanced features, requiring quite extensive knowledge of aerodynamics. There were no such things as airplanes in these times, we are told by archeologists and historians. But this case seems to be an exception, living in the midst of the rather unimaginative and rigid paradigm of contemporary science. It is also necessary to point out that Egyptians are known to have nearly always made scale-models of projects and objects which they planned to create or build.

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Precolombian Airplane Models

Is the concept of an airplane limited to Egypt? That doesn't seem to be the case. Gold trinkets were found in an area covering Central America and coastal areas of South America, estimated to belong to a period between 500 and 800 CE, but since they are made from gold, accurate dating is impossible and based essentially on stratigraphy which may be deceptive. However, we can safely say that these gold objects are more than 1000 years old.

Whatever this object is supposed to be or represent,
its remarkable resemblance to a modern aircraft or spacecraft is uncanny.

As seen from the pictures, the shape of the sample object is rather ambiguous. The archaeologists labelled these objects as zoomorphic, meaning, animal shaped objects. The question is, what animal do they represent? When we compare these with other objects from the same cultures depicting animals, a curious facet of the comparison would be obvious: the other objects are recognizable, rendered usually with a great accuracy and attention to realistic detail.

There are several types of animals which fly—birds, insects, and several mammals, such as bats and some gliders, for instance flying squirrels, oppossums, and then there are some lizards; there are also some fish which for brief periods glide through the air. There are water animals which seem to fly through the water, such as rays, skates and some selachians. But how does the depicted object compare with these choices? All its features taken into a consideration, we have no match. Seen from above, the object obviously has no fish features, but seems to show rather explicitly mechanistic ones.

The structures just in front of the tail are strongly reminiscent of elevons (a combination of ailerons and elevators) with a slight forward curve, but they are attached to the fuselage, rather than the wings. In any case, they look more like airplane parts than like the claspers of a fish. If the two prominent spirals on the wings are supposed to be a stylized version of the eyes of a ray, then what are the two globular objects positioned on the head supposed to represent? To complicate the identification even more, the spirals on the wings have their copies positioned on the nose of the object, in the opposite direction. When the object is viewed in profile, the didsimilarity to anything from the animal kingdom is even more pronounced. If the zoomorphic explanation is supposed to hold, then why did the artist cut the head off almost three quarters from the body? And why is the nose is practically rectangular and the cut tilted forward, with eyes positioned at either side, when fish eyes are usually more near the center of bodyline and far forward on the head?

What we can make of the semicircular grooves on the inside of the cut? What is it supposed to be—fishwise? And what about the scoop, forward and under the cut? It is a scoop, not just a ridge for drilling a hole through to place the object on a necklace chain. Then there is another rectangular feature, positioned further back at the approximate center of gravity under the fuselage. The wings when viewed from the side are perfetly horizontal, but when seen from the front, they curve slightly downward. The elevators, which are right behind the wings, are positioned on a slightly higher horizontal level and are square-ended, thus a definite geometric shape. Above them is another rectangular shape, with a relief which may be reminiscent of knobs. The tail is equally intriguing. No fish has only a single, upright and perpendicular flange. But this tail fin has an exact shape of fins on modern airplanes. There are also some markings on the tail which are hard to identify, but it does not seem to be anything related to animals, either.

When all the features are taken into an account, the object does not look like a representation of any known animal at all, but does look astonishingly like an airplane. The photos and enlarged outline of the object has been submitted for an analysis to several people from the field of aerodynamics. One of them was Arthur Young, a designer of Bell helicopters and other aircraft. His analysis confirmed that the object contains many features which would fit the airplane hypothesis, but there were several ones which would not fit that scenario. Wings do seem to be in the wrong place—they should be further forward so that their 1/4-chord coincides with the center of gravity. The nose is not like anything on airplanes, as well. So, while the object is suggesting an airplane, some features would not seem to support this hypothesis.

But let's entertain several possibilities. If we imagine that the separation after the windshield is not a cockpit and that the pilot and the cargo were located somewhere in the main fuselage body, then we can envision the nose as something else. Let's assume that the nose is actually a jet. If the machine needs to slow down, the jet flow directed against the path of flight would accomplish just that. But how to redirect the jet into the opposite direction? If we envision the nose as a movable part of the plane, turning around the point located where the nose and fuselage meet, thus pivoting the nose downward to tuck it under the fuselage, that would enable the desired effect. What's more, it will re-adjust the center of gravity and the wings would be just in the right place for a high powered flight. Another problem, though, will appear and that is the drag which would be created by the back of the nose now positioned in front. But that can be attributed to artistic license. That seems to be the case, because several other similar planes feature the back part of the nose tilted more forward, so the angle of the back of the nose when pivoted is more corresponding to aerodynamic principles.

All things considered, the object seems to represent a convertible type of craft, with two possible configurations—one for ascent when the nose is facing backwards, and the other for descent with the nose facing forward. One unsolved item remains—the spirals on the both wings and the nose. According to Amerindian iconography, these spirals have discernable meaning—they represent ascending and descending, depending on whether they are right-oriented or left-oriented, respectively. As the spirals are not only on wings but also on the nose, the meaning is fairly obvious—the wings and the nose (as much) were the features which were directly involved in ascent and descent.

There are other cultures which mention flying vehicles of some sort or another. The most known of these sources are Indian epics, especially the Mahábhárata and other Védic sources as Bhágavata Purána and Rámáyana. The flying devices were called vimánas and were extensively discussed in Vaimánika Shástra, describing multitude of machines with different purposes and capabilities.

Other source of information about flying machines may be considered, such as the Bible and some apocryphal works. The book of Ezekiel seems to be describing the close encounter of a man from a non-technological culture with a device which to him must have been miraculous. We have to put ourselves into his shoes to comprehend his astonishment and the otherworldness of his encounter. The limited scope of knowledge of the world around him, his primitive environment, dictated the language and conceptual framework with which he tried to capture his encounter for fellow tribesmen. For him it seemed that he encountered The God, with his suite of angels, because in his simple world, there was no other interpretation. It is not necessary to reach for an alien type of scenario to explain the encounter; we can entertain a possibility that a remnant of an advanced civilization was still present, in a limited scope, at the time of Ezekiel. But for some, the encounter bears uncanny similarity to the modern-day encounters with UFO's. Another source of similar material is the Book of Enoch, particularly the Slavic version, which contains some parts which the Greek version is missing. The book not only describes flying in the air, but also through outer space, including the relativistic effects mentioned—Enoch spent several days on a spacecraft, but when he returned to Earth, several centuries had passed by.

There is no shortage of descriptions of flying machines in ancient sources. If we try to extract the core of myths of different provenience and remove the embellishments, we discover to our surprise that flying in ancient times seems to be the rule, not the exception.

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Ancient Indian Aircraft Technology

Many researchers into the UFO enigma tend to overlook a very important fact. While it assumed that most flying saucers are of alien, or perhaps Governmental Military origin, another possible origin of UFOs is ancient India and Atlantis.

What we know about ancient Indian flying vehicles comes from ancient Indian sources; written texts that have come down to us through the centuries. There is no doubt that most of these texts are authentic; many are the well known ancient Indian Epics themselves, and there are literally hundreds of them. Most of them have not even been translated into English yet from the old Sanskrit.

The Indian Emperor Ashoka started a "Secret Society of the Nine Unknown Men": great Indian scientists who were supposed to catalogue the many sciences. Ashoka kept their work secret because he was afraid that the advanced science catalogued by these men, culled from ancient Indian sources, would be used for the evil purpose of war, which Ashoka was strongly against, having been converted to Buddhism after defeating a rival army in a bloody battle.

The "Nine Unknown Men" wrote a total of nine books, presumably one each. Book number was "The Secrets of Gravitation!" This book, known to historians, but not actually seen by them dealt chiefly with "gravity control." It is presumably still around somewhere, kept in a secret library in India, Tibet or elsewhere (perhaps even in North America somewhere). One can certainly understand Ashoka's reasoning for wanting to keep such knowledge a secret, assuming it exists. if the Nazis had such weapons at their disposal during World War Ii. Ashoka was also aware devastating wars using such advanced vehicles and other "futuristic weapons" that had destroyed the ancient Indian "Rama Empire" several thousand years before.

Only a few years ago, the Chinese discovered some Sanskrit documents in Lhasa, Tibet and sent them to the University of Chandrigarh to be translated. Dr. Ruth Reyna of the University said recently that the documents contain directions for building interstellar spaceships!

Their method of propulsion, she said, was "anti-gravitational" and was based upon a system analogous to that of "laghima," the unknown power of the ego existing in man's physiological makeup, "a centrifugal force strong enough to counteract all gravitational pull." According to Hindu Yogis, it is this "laghima" which enables a person to levitate.

Dr. Reyna said that on board these machines, which were called "Astras" by the text, the ancient Indians could have sent a detachment of men onto any planet, according to the document, which is thought to be thousands of years old. The manuscripts were also said to reveal the secret of "antima"; "the cap of invisibility" and "garima"; "how to become as heavy as a mountain of lead."

Naturally, Indian scientists did not take the texts very seriously, but then became more positive about the value of them when the Chinese announced that they were including certain parts of the data for study in their space program! This was one of the first instances of a government admitting to be researching anti-gravity.

The manuscripts did not say definitely that interplanetary travel was ever made but did mention, of all things, a planned trip to the Moon, though it is not clear whether this trip was actually carried out. However, one of the great Indian epics, the Ramayana, does have a highly detailed story in it of a trip to the moon in a Vimana (or "Astra"), and in fact details a battle on the moon with an "Asvin" (or Atlantean" airship.

This is but a small bit of recent evidence of anti-gravity and aerospace technology used by Indians. To really understand the technology, we must go much further back in time.

The so-called "Rama Empire" of Northern India and Pakistan developed at least fifteen thousand years ago on the Indian sub-continent and was a nation of many large, sophisticated cities, many of which are still to be found in the deserts of Pakistan, northern, and western India. Rama existed, apparently, parallel to the Atlantean civilization in the mid-Atlantic Ocean, and was ruled by "enlightened Priest-Kings" who governed the cities, The seven greatest capital cities of Rama were known in classical Hindu texts as "The Seven Rishi Cities."

According to ancient Indian texts, the people had flying machines which were called "Vimanas." The ancient Indian epic describes a Vimana as a double-deck, circular aircraft with portholes and a dome, much as we would imagine a flying saucer.

It flew with the "speed of the wind" and gave forth a "melodious sound." There were at least four different types of Vimanas; some saucer shaped, others like long cylinders ("cigar shaped airships"). The ancient Indian texts on Vimanas are so numerous, it would take volumes to relate what they had to say. The ancient Indians, who manufactured these ships themselves, wrote entire flight manuals on the control of the various types of Vimanas, many of which are still in existence, and some have even been translated into English.

The Samara Sutradhara is a scientific treatise dealing with every possible angle of air travel in a Vimana. There are 230 stanzas dealing with the construction, take-off, cruising for thousand of miles, normal and forced landings, and even possible collisions with birds. In 1875, the Vaimanika Sastra, a fourth century B.C. text written by Bharadvajy the Wise, using even older texts as his source, was rediscovered in a temple in India. It dealt with the operation of Vimanas and included information on the steering, precautions for long flights, protection of the airships from storms and lightening and how to switch the drive to "solar energy" from a free energy source which sounds like "anti-gravity."

The Vaimanika Sastra (or Vymaanika-Shaastra) has eight chapters with diagrams, describing three types of aircraft, including apparatuses that could neither catch on fire nor break. It also mentions 31 essential parts of these vehicles and 16 materials from which they are constructed, which absorb light and heat; for which reason they were considered suitable for the construction of Vimanas. This document has been translated into English and is available by writing the publisher: VYMAANIDASHAASTRA AERONAUTICS by Maharishi Bharadwaaja, translated into English and edited, printed and published by Mr. G. R. Josyer, Mysore, India, 1979 (sorry, no street address). Mr. Josyer is the director of the International Academy of Sanskrit Investigation located in Mysore.

Click on the picture to visit A Tribute to Hinduism - Vimanas

There seems to be no doubt that Vimanas were powered by some sort of "anti-gravity." Vimanas took off vertically, and were capable of hovering in the sky, like a modern helicopter or dirigible. Bharadvajy the Wise refers to no less than 70 authorities and 10 experts of air travel in antiquity. These sources are now lost.

Vimanas were kept in a Vimana Griha, a kind of hanger, and were sometimes said to be propelled by a yellowish-white liquid, and sometimes by some sort of mercury compound, though writers seem confused in this matter. It is most likely that the later writers on Vimanas, wrote as observers and from earlier texts, and were understandably confused on the principle of their propulsion. The "yellowish-white liquid" sounds suspiciously like gasoline, and perhaps Vimanas had a number of different propulsion sources, including combustion engines and even "pulse-jet" engines. It is interesting to note, that the Nazis developed the first practical pulse-jet engines for their V-8 rocket "buzz bombs." Hitler and the Nazi staff were exceptionally interested in ancient India and Tibet and sent expeditions to both these places yearly, starting in the 30's, in order to gather esoteric evidence that they did so, and perhaps it was from these people that the Nazis gained some of their scientific information!

According to the Dronaparva, part of the Mahabarata, and the Ramayana, one Vimana described was shaped like a sphere and born along at great speed on a mighty wind generated by mercury. It moved like a UFO, going up, down, backwards and forewards as the pilot desired. In another Indian source, the Samar, Vimanas were "iron machines, well-knit and smooth, with a charge of mercury that shot out of the back in the form of a roaring flame." Another work called the Samaranganasutradhara describes how the vehicles were constructed. It is possible that mercury did have something to do with the propulsion, or more possibly, with the guidance system. Curiously, Soviet scientists have discovered what they call "age-old instruments used in navigating cosmic vehicles" in caves in Turkestan and the Gobi Desert. The "devices" are hemispherical objects of glass or porcelain, ending in a cone with a drop of mercury inside.

It is evident that ancient Indians flew around in these vehicles, all over Asia, to Atlantis presumably; and even, apparently, to South America. Writing found at Mohenjodaro in Pakistan (presumed to be one of the "Seven Rishi Cities of the Rama Empire") and still undeciphered, has also been found in one other place in the world: Easter Island! Writing on Easter Island, called Rongo-Rongo writing, is also undeciphered, and is uncannily similar to the Mohenjodaro script. Was Easter Island an air base for the Rama Empire's Vimana route? (At the Mohenjo-Daro Vimana-drome, as the passenger walks down the concourse, he hears the sweet, melodic sound of the announcer over the loudspeaker,

"Rama Airways flight number seven for Bali, Easter Island, Nazca, and Atlantis is now ready for boarding. Passengers please proceed to gate number..") in Tibet, no small distance, and speaks of the "fiery chariot" thusly: "Bhima flew along in his car, resplendent as the sun and loud as thunder... The flying chariot shone like a flame in the night sky of summer ... it swept by like a comet... It was as if two suns were shining. Then the chariot rose up and all the heaven brightened."

In the Mahavira of Bhavabhuti, a Jain text of the eighth century culled from older texts and traditions, we read:

"An aerial chariot, the Pushpaka, conveys many people to the capital of Ayodhya. The sky is full of stupendous flying-machines, dark as night, but picked out by lights with a yellowish glare"

The Vedas, ancient Hindu poems, thought to be the oldest of all the Indian texts, describe Vimanas of various shapes and sizes: the "ahnihotra-vimana" with two engines, the "elephant-vimana" with more engines, and other types named after the kingfisher, ibis and other animals.

Unfortunately, Vimanas, like most scientific discoveries, were ultimately used for war. Atlanteans used their flying machines, "Vailixi," a similar type of aircraft, to literally try and subjugate the world, it would seem, if Indian texts are to be believed. The Atlanteans, known as "Asvins" in the Indian writings, were apparently even more advanced technologically than the Indians, and certainly of a more war-like temperment. Although no ancient texts on Atlantean Vailixi are known to exist, some information has come down through esoteric, "occult" sources which describe their flying machines. Similar, if not identical to Vimanas, Vailixi were generally "cigar shaped" and had the capability of maneuvering underwater as well as in the atmosphere or even outer space. Other vehicles, like Vimanas, were saucer shaped, and could apparently also be submerged.

According to Eklal Kueshana, author of "The Ultimate Frontier," in an article he wrote in 1966, Vailixi were first developed in Atlantis 20,000 years ago, and the most common ones are "saucer-shaped of generally trapezoidal cross-section with three hemispherical engine pods on the underside." "They use a mechanical antigravity device driven by engines developing approximately 80,000 horse power."

The Ramayana, Mahabarata and other texts speak of the hideous war that took place, some ten or twelve thousand years ago between Atlantis and Rama using weapons of destruction that could not be imagined by readers until the second half of this century.

The ancient Mahabharata, one of the sources on Vimanas, goes on to tell the awesome destructiveness of the war: 

"...(the weapon was) a single projectile
charged with all the power of the Universe.
An incandescent column of smoke and flame
As bright as the thousand suns rose in all its splendor... 

An iron thunderbolt,
A gigantic messenger of death,
Which reduced to ashes
The entire race of the Vrishnis
And the Andhakas.

... the corpses were so burned
As to be unrecognizable.
The hair and nails fell out;
Pottery broke without apparent cause,
And the birds turned white.

... After a few hours
All foodstuffs were infected...
... to escape from this fire
The soldiers threw themselves in streams
To wash themselves and their equipment..."

It would seem that the Mahabharata is describing an atomic war! References like this one are not isolated; but battles, using a fantastic array of weapons and aerial vehicles are common in all the epic Indian books. One even describes a Vimana-Vailix battle on the Moon! The above section very accurately describes what an atomic explosion would look like and the effects of the radioactivity on the population. Jumping into water is the only respite.

When the Rishi City of Mohenjodaro was excavated by archeologists in the last century, they found skeletons just lying in the streets, some of them holding hands, as if some great doom had suddenly overtaken them. These skeletons are among the most radioactive ever found, on a par with those found at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Ancient cities whose brick and stone walls have literally been vitrified, that is-fused together, can be found in India, Ireland, Scotland, France, Turkey and other places. There is no logical explanation for the vitrification of stone forts and cities, except from an atomic blast. Furthermore, at Mohenjo-Daro, a well planned city laid on a grid, with a plumbing system superior to those used in Pakistan and India today, the streets were littered with "black lumps of glass." These globs of glass were discovered to be clay pots that had melted under intense heat!

With the cataclysmic sinking of Atlantis and the wiping out of Rama with atomic weapons, the world collapsed into a "stone age" of sorts, and modern history picks up a few thousand years later. Yet, it would seem that not all the Vimanas and Vailixi of Rama and Atlantis were gone. Built to last for thousands of of years, many of them would still be in use, as evidenced by Ashoka's "Nine Unknown Men" and the Lhasa manuscript.

That secret societies or "Brotherhoods" of exceptional, "enlightened" human beings would have preserved these inventions and the knowledge of science, history, etc., does not seem surprising. Many well known historical personages including Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Krishna, Zoroaster, Mahavira, Quetzalcoatl, Akhenaton, Moses, and more recent inventors and of course many other people who will probably remain anonymous, were probably members of such a secret organization.

It is interesting to note that when Alexander the Great invaded India more than two thousand years ago, his historians chronicled that at one point they were attacked by "flying, fiery shields" that dove at his army and frightened the cavalry. These "flying saucers" did not use any atomic bombs or beam weapons on Alexander's army however, perhaps out of benevolence, and Alexander went on to conquer India.

It has been suggested by many writers that these "Brotherhoods" keep some of their Vimanas and Vailixi in secret caverns in Tibet or some other place is Central Asia, and the Lop Nor Desert in western China is known to be the center of a great UFO mystery. Perhaps it is here that many of the airships are still kept, in underground bases much as the Americans, British and Soviets have built around the world in the past few decades.

Still, not all UFO activity can be accounted for by old Vimanas making trips to the Moon for some reason. Undoubtedly, some are from the Military Governments of the world, and possibly even from other planets. Of course, many UFO sightings are "swamp, gas, clouds, hoaxes, and hallucinations, while there is considerable evidence that many UFO sightings, especially "kidnappings" and the like, are the result of what is generally called "telepathic hypnosis." One common thread that often runs between "Alien kidnappings," "sex with aliens," and other "close encounters of a third kind" is a buzzing in the ears just before the encounter. According to many well informed people, this is a sure sign of telepathic hypnosis."

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ANCIENT VIMANA AIRCRAFT

SOURCE: John Burrows

Sanskrit texts are filled with references to gods who fought battles in the sky using Vimanas equipped with weapons as deadly as any we can deploy in these more enlightened times. For example, there is a passage in the Ramayana which reads:

"The Puspaka car that resembles the Sun and belongs to my brother was brought by the powerful Ravan; that aerial and excellent car going everywhere at will .... that car resembling a bright cloud in the sky."

".. and the King [Rama] got in, and the excellent car at the command of the Raghira, rose up into the higher atmosphere."

In the Mahabharatra, an ancient Indian poem of enormous length, we learn that an individual named Asura Maya had a Vimana measuring twelve cubits in circumference, with four strong wheels. The poem is a veritable gold mine of information relating to conflicts between gods who settled their differences apparently using weapons as lethal as the ones we are capable of deploying. Apart from 'blazing missiles', the poem records the use of other deadly weapons. 'Indra's Dart' operated via a circular 'reflector'. When switched on, it produced a 'shaft of light' which, when focused on any target, immediately 'consumed it with its power'. In one particular exchange, the hero, Krishna, is pursuing his enemy, Salva, in the sky, when Salva's Vimana, the Saubha is made invisible in some way. Undeterred, Krishna immediately fires off a special weapon: 'I quickly laid on an arrow, which killed by seeking out sound'. Many other terrible weapons are described, quite matter of factly, in the Mahabharata, but the most fearsome of all is the one used against the Vrishis. The narrative records:

"Gurkha flying in his swift and powerful Vimana hurled against the three cities of the Vrishis and Andhakas a single projectile charged with all the power of the Universe. An incandescent column of smoke and fire, as brilliant as ten thousands suns, rose in all its splendour. It was the unknown weapon, the Iron Thunderbolt, a gigantic messaenger of death which reduced to ashes the entire race of the Vrishnis and Andhakas."

It is important to note, that these kinds of records are not isolated. They can be cross-correlated with similiar reports in other ancient civilizations. The after-affects of this Iron Thunderbolt have an ominously recognizable ring. Apparently, those killed by it were so burnt that their corpses were unidentifiable. The survivors fared little etter, as it caused their hair and nails to fall out.

Perhaps the most disturbing and challenging, information about these allegedly mythical Vimanas in the ancient records is that there are some matter-of-fact records, describing how to build one. In their way, the instructions are quite precise.

In the Sanskrit Samarangana Sutradhara, it is written:

"Strong and durable must the body of the Vimana be made, like a great flying bird of light material. Inside one must put the mercury engine with its iron heating apparatus underneath. By means of the power latent in the mecrcury which sets the driving whirlwind in motion, a man sitting inside may travel a great distance in the sky. The movements of the Vimana are such that it can vertically ascend, vertically descend, move slanting forwards and backwards. With the help of the machines human beings can fly in the air and heavenly beings can come down to earth."

The Hakatha (Laws of the Babylonians) states quite unambiguously: "The privilege of operating a flying machine is great. The knowledge of flight is among the most ancient of our inheritances. A gift from 'those from upon high'. We received it from them as a means of saving many lives."

More fantastic still is the information given in the ancient Chaldean work, The Sifrala, which contains over one hundred pages of technical details on building a flying machine. It contains words which translate as graphite rod, copper coils, crystal indicator, vibrating spheres, stable angles, etc.

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Flying high

Hundred years after Orville Wright’s first flight, K R N SWAMY remembers Shivkur Bapuji Talpade, the Indian who flew an unmanned aircraft, eight years before Wright.

Orville Wright demonstrated on December 17th 1903 that it was possible for a ‘manned heavier than air machine to fly’. But, in 1895, eight years earlier, the Sanskrit scholar Shivkar Bapuji Talpade had designed a basic aircraft called Marutsakthi (meaning Power of Air) based on Vedic technology and had it take off unmanned before a large audience in the Chowpathy beach of Bombay. The importance of the Wright brothers lies in the fact, that it was a manned flight for a distance of 120 feet and Orville Wright became the first man to fly. But Talpade’s unmanned aircraft flew to a height of 1500 feet before crashing down and the historian Evan Koshtka, has described Talpade as the ‘first creator of an aircraft’.

As the world observes the one hundredth anniversary of the first manned flight, it is interesting to consider the saga of India’s 19th century first aircraft inventor for his design was entirely based on the rich treasury of India’s Vedas. Shivkar Bapuji Talpade was born in 1864 in the locality of Chirabazar at Dukkarwadi in Bombay.

He was a scholar of Sanskrit and from his young age was attracted by the Vaimanika Sastra (Aeronautical Science) expounded by the great Indian sage Maharishi Bhardwaja. One western scholar of Indology Stephen-Knapp has put in simple words or rather has tried to explain what Talpade did and succeeded!

According to Knapp, the Vaimanika Shastra describes in detail, the construction of what is called, the mercury vortex engine the forerunner of the ion engines being made today by NASA. Knapp adds that additional information on the mercury engines can be found in the ancient Vedic text called Samaranga Sutradhara. This text also devotes 230 verses, to the use of these machines in peace and war. The Indologist William Clarendon, who has written down a detailed description of the mercury vortex engine in his translation of Samaranga Sutradhara quotes thus ‘Inside the circular air frame, place the mercury-engine with its solar mercury boiler at the aircraft center. By means of the power latent in the heated mercury which sets the driving whirlwind in motion a man sitting inside may travel a great distance in a most marvellous manner. Four strong mercury containers must be built into the interior structure. When these have been heated by fire through solar or other sources the vimana (aircraft) develops thunder-power through the mercury.

NASA (National Aeronau-tical and Space Administra-tion) world’s richest/ most powerful scientific organisation is trying to create an ion engine that is a device that uses a stream of high velocity electrified particles instead of a blast of hot gases like in present day modern jet engines. Surprisingly according to the bi-monthly Ancient Skies published in USA, the aircraft engines being developed for future use by NASA by some strange coincidence also uses mercury bombardment units powered by Solar cells! Interestingly, the impulse is generated in seven stages. The mercury propellant is first vapourised fed into the thruster discharge chamber ionised converted into plasma by a combination with electrons broke down electrically and then accelerated through small openings in a screen to pass out of the engine at velocities between 1200 to 3000 kilometres per minute! But so far NASA has been able to produce an experimental basis only a one pound of thrust by its scientists a power derivation virtually useless. But 108 years ago Talpade was able to use his knowledge of Vaimanika Shastra to produce sufficient thrust to lift his aircraft 1500 feet into the air!

According to Indian scholar Acharya, ‘Vaimanika Shastra deals about aeronautics including the design of aircraft the way they can be used for transportation and other applications in detail. The knowledge of aeronautics is described in Sanskrit in 100 sections, eight chapters, 500 principles and 3000 slokas including 32 techniques to fly an aircraft. In fact, depending on the classifications of eras or Yugas in modern Kaliyuga aircraft used are called Krithakavimana flown by the power of engines by absorbing solar energies!’ It is feared that only portions of Bharadwaja’s masterpiece Vaimanika Shas-tra survive today.

The question that comes to one’s mind is, what happened to this wonderful encyclopaedia of aeronautical knowledge accumulated by the Indian savants of yore, and why was it not used? But in those days, such knowledge was the preserve of sages, who would not allow it to be misused, just like the knowledge of atomic bombs is being used by terrorists today!

According to scholar Ratnakar Mahajan who wrote a brochure on Talpade. ‘Being a Sanskrit scholar interested in aeronautics, Talpade studied and consulted a number of Vedic treatises like Brihad Vaimanika Shastra of Maharishi Bharadwaja Vimanachandrika of Acharya Narayan Muni Viman yantra of Maharish Shownik Yantra Kalp by Maharishi Garg Muni Viman Bindu of Acharya Vachaspati and Vimana Gyanarka Prakashika of Maharishi Dhundiraj’. This gave him confidence that he can build an aircraft with mercury engines. One essential factor in the creation of these Vedic aircraft was the timing of the Suns Rays or Solar energy (as being now utilised by NASA) when they were most effective to activate the mercury ions of the engine. Happily for Talpade Maharaja Sayaji Rao Gaekwad of Baroda a great supporter of the Sciences in India, was willing to help him and Talpade went ahead with his aircraft construction with mercury engines. One day in 1895 (unfortunately the actual date is not mentioned in the Kesari newspaper of Pune which covered the event) before an curious scholarly audience headed by the famous Indian judge/ nationalist/ Mahadeva Govin-da Ranade and H H Sayaji Rao Gaekwad Talpade had the good fortune to see his un manned aircraft named as ‘Marutsakthi’ take off, fly to a height of 1500 feet and then fall down to earth.

But this success of an Indian scientist was not liked by the Imperial rulers. Warned by the British Government the Maharaja of Baroda stopped helping Talpade. It is said that the remains of the Marutsakthi were sold to ‘foreign parties’ by the relatives of Talpade in order to salvage whatever they can out of their loans to him. Talpade’s wife died at this critical juncture and he was not in a mental frame to continue with his researches. But his efforts to make known the greatness of Vedic Shastras was recognised by Indian scholars, who gave him the title of Vidya Prakash Pra-deep.

Talpade passed away in 1916 un-honoured, in his own country.

As the world rightly honours the Wright Brothers for their achievements, we should think of Talpade, who utilised the ancient knowledge of Sanskrit texts, to fly an aircraft, eight years before his foreign counterparts.