12 May - Norge first vessel to fly over the North Pole in 1926

 

On 12 May 1926, The Italian-built airship Norge became the first vessel to fly over the North Pole.

The Norge was a semi-rigid Italian-built airship that carried out the first verified trip of any kind to the North Pole and likely the first verified overflight on 12 May 1926. It was also the first aircraft to fly over the polar ice cap between Europe and America. The expedition was the brainchild of polar explorer and expedition leader Roald Amundsen, the airship's designer and pilot Umberto Nobile and American explorer Lincoln Ellsworth, who along with the Aero Club of Norway, financed the trip which was known as the Amundsen-Ellsworth 1926 Transpolar Flight.