Weatherwatch: How the weather affected early flight record attempts

René Fonck, who tried to make the first flight from New York to Paris in September 1926. Photograph: George Rinhart/Corbis/Getty Images

In September 1926, the French pilot René Fonck set out on a daring attempt to make the first crossing from New York to Paris in an aircraft, piloting a custom-built Sikorsky S-35.

John Alcock and Arthur Brown had flown the shorter distance from Newfoundland, Canada, to County Galway, Ireland, seven years earlier. That was in June, when good weather was expected, but the aviators encountered dense fog and freezing temperatures in an eventful but successful flight.