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This is a list of aviation-related events from 1980:
Events
January
- January 8 - a Mooney 231 lands in San Francisco, after flying coast to coast non-stop, setting a record by completing the flight in 8 hours and 4 minutes.
- January 16 - British Island Airways and Air Anglia merge to form Air UK.
February
- an Aeroflot Ilyushin Il-18 flies 30,000 km (18,642 miles) from Moscow to the Molodezhnaya observatory in the Antarctic
March
- March 12-14 - two B-52 Stratofortresses make a non-stop round-the-world flight in 42.5 hours
- March 28 - The 1,000th production Learjet is delivered.
April
- April 18 - Air Zimbabwe is formed.
- April 24 - helicopters from USS Nimitz participate in the abortive Operation Eagle Claw, a plan to rescue US hostages from Iran
June
- European Helicopter Industries is formed.
- June 13 - the last produced Concorde (number 16) is delivered to British Airways.
- June 19 - Sikorsky delivers its last of the S-61 commercial helicopeters.
- June 23 - Sanjay Gandhi, son of Indira Gandhi, dies when his private aerobatic biplane has an accident.
July
- July 6 - the largest light airplane meet outside the United States brings 750 small planes to the Popular Flying Associations annual meeting in Leicester.
- July 17 - a Vickers Viscount plane of charter airline Alidair lands safely in Devon after suffering damage to all four engines.
- July 17 - Cathay Pacific begins a Hong Kong-London service
- July 21 - the F-16 is officially nicknamed the Fighting Falcon in a ceremony.
August
- August 7 - Janice Brown pilots the MacCready Gossamer Penguin on its first solar powered flight.
- August 19 - a Saudi Arabian Airlines Lockheed L-1011 makes a safe emergency landing in Riyadh, but panicked passengers suffocate and burn in a subsequent stampede. All inside the plane die.
September
- September 22 - Iraq attacks Iran, various military bases and oil wells affected.
- September 28 - Iraqi Tupolev Tu-22s land in Riyadh after bombing Iran
October
- October 2 - a Westland Sea King performs the rescue of 22 passengers from the Swedish ship Finneagle in the North Sea.
- October 20 - first dog fights of the Iran-Iraq War. An Iraqi Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 is shot down by Iranian F-4 Phantoms
November
- November 1 - British Airways terminates Concorde services to Bahrain and Singapore
- November 9 - Dan-Air registers the last commercial flight by a de Havilland Comet. The plane flew enthusiasts on a round-trip flight from London.
- November 12 - Delta Air Lines orders 60 Boeing 757s, the largest single order to this time for a single airliner type.
December
- December 7 - Pan Am's Boeing 747, the China Clipper, arrives from JFK International Airport in New York, to Beijing, after a stop in Tokyo. It marks the first time since 1949 that a commercial flight between the United States and mainland China is completed.
First flights
May
June
July
August
September
November
Entered service
November
- November 13 - F/A-18 Hornet with VFA-125 at NAS Leemore.
December
"1980 in aviation"