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The White Bird

L'Oiseau Blanc
Faded brown postcard with a photograph of a white biplane. Two oval cameo pictures are above the aircraft, showing the faces of two men. On the left, is a clean-shaven healthy-looking man in his mid-30s, with a pilot's squint. On the right, is a slightly more heavyset man with a black eyepatch over his right eye.
1927 postcard showing L'Oiseau Blanc, with pictures of Nungesser (left) and Coli (right)
Type Levasseur PL.8
Construction number PL.8-01
First flight April 1927
Fate Disappeared during transatlantic flight attempt

L'Oiseau Blanc (commonly known in the English-speaking world as The White Bird ) was a French Levasseur PL.8 biplane that disappeared in 1927, during an attempt to make the first non-stop transatlantic flight between Paris and New York to compete for the Orteig Prize. The aircraft was flown by French World War I aviation heroes, Charles Nungesser and François Coli. The aircraft disappeared after its 8 May 1927 takeoff from Paris. Two weeks later, Charles Lindbergh successfully made the New York–Paris journey and claimed the prize, flying the Spirit of St. Louis.

The disappearance of L'Oiseau Blanc is considered one of the great mysteries in the history of aviation. Many rumors circulated about the fate of the aircraft and crew, with mainstream opinion at the time being that the aircraft was probably lost in a squall over the Atlantic. Investigations starting in the 1980s suggest that the aircraft probably reached Newfoundland, and may have crashed in Maine.

The disappearance of Nungesser and Coli has an extensive legacy, and is referred to in many films and museums. A street in Paris is named after the aviators, and a commemorative postage stamp was issued in 1967. A statue at the Paris Le Bourget Airport honors the attempted flight, and there is a memorial on the cliffs of Étretat, from where their aircraft was last seen in France.

In 1919, New York hotel owner Raymond Orteig offered a USD $25,000 prize, the Orteig Prize, to the first aviators to make a non-stop transatlantic flight between New York and Paris during the next five years. With no takers, he renewed the offer in 1924, when aviation technology had advanced enough at that point that many people tried for the prize. Most were attempting to fly from New York to Paris, but a number of French aviators planned an attempt to fly in the opposite direction, from Paris to New York.


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