Aviation milestone

Friday, Feb. 8, 2008 | 2 a.m.

One of the most exciting and significant events in the history of modern transportation got started 100 years ago this month “The Great Auto Race of 1908.”

Beginning in New York City and finishing in Paris, the route included the roadless West, Alaska and Siberia. Of local interest, the winning car, a Thomas Flyer manufactured by the E.R. Thomas Motor Co. of Buffalo, N.Y., and driven by an American crew, is on display at the National Automobile Museum in Reno.

Of worldwide interest at the time, though, was the fact that an automobile could prove itself reliable enough to be driven 22,000 miles in just 169 days, having encountered snow, quicksand and all manner of backcountry terrain along the way. The race was key in demonstrating that automobiles were a durable, practical form of transportation, and the rest is history including the pollution that cars have wrought.

On the centennial of the great race, another major transportation event, perhaps one day rivaling it in significance, is set to take place. A commercial airplane, for the first time, will take off this month with its fuel tanks filled with cleaner-burning biofuel.

The plane, a Boeing 747-400, belongs to Virgin Atlantic, whose founder and president is Richard Branson, the British adventurer and entrepreneur. He is heavily invested in alternative fuels and several years ago committed his Virgin Group of companies to going green.

Writing about the upcoming historic flight from London to Amsterdam, the San Francisco Chronicle said it will “have everyone in the airline industry watching.”

If the demonstration flight with no passengers is successful, it could mark the beginning of a new era in aviation. The Chronicle reported that aircraft represent up to 12 percent of greenhouse gas emissions by the U.S. transportation sector. If there’s no breakthrough, the emissions could account for nearly 20 percent by 2025.

There is no doubt that years of testing are ahead before biofuels become standard on planes. But we don’t have to wait years before admiring the spirit, in the tradition of the great race, that led to this promising milestone in transportation.