1976 in aviation

January
January 1 - Middle East Airlines Flight 438, a Boeing 720, aircraft over Saudi Arabia when bomb exploded in the forward baggage compartment, aircraft destroyed killing 81.

March
March 17 - A Japan Air Lines Boeing 747 makes the first non-stop flight from Tokyo to New York, taking 11.5 hours for the 10,139 km (6,300 mile) journey.

April
April 5 - Howard Hughes dies aboard a Learjet, aged 70.

April 27 – American Airlines Flight 625, a Boeing 727, crashed on approach to St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands.

May
May 3 - A Pan Am Boeing 747SP makes a record around-the-world flight, taking 1 day 22 hours.
May 24 - Three hijackers and seven hostages die as Filipino troops storm a hijacked Philippines Airlines Douglas DC-9.

July
July 1 - Clive Canning arrives in the United Kingdom, having flown from Australia in a Thorp T-18 homebuilt aircraft.

July 3 - Three Israeli Air Force C-130 Hercules carry commandos to Entebbe, Uganda to rescue the 258 passengers of an Air France Airbus hijacked six days earlier. This is the operation Entebbe.

August
August 1 - October 1 - After his 1973 RTW attempt was aborted by bad weather between Hokkaidō and the Aleutian Islands, Don Taylor of California successfully circumnavigates the world (Oshkosh eastbound to Oshkosh) in his Thorp T-18, the first aviator to do so with a homebuilt aircraft.

September
September 6 - Viktor Belenko of the Soviet Union defects to the West, landing his MiG-25 FoxBat in Japan.

September 10 - In the worst mid-air disaster to this point, the 1976 Zagreb mid-air collision, 176 people die when a British Airways Hawker Siddeley Trident and an Inex Adria Douglas DC-9 collide over Zagreb.

September 14 - A F-14 Tomcat rolls off the deck of USS John F. Kennedy and sinks in international waters. A major salvage operation is launched to retrieve the fighter lest it fall into Soviet hands.

September 18 - Death of legendary test pilot Albert Boyd

September 19 - A THY Boeing 727 crashed into a mountain in Turkey killing 154.

October
October 6 – Cubana Flight 455, a Douglas DC-8, bombed by Anti-Castro terrorists.

First flights

May
May 19 - Utva 75 53001

July
July 3 - Piaggio P.166 I-PJAG
July 30 - HAL Kiran Mk II U738

August
August 9 - Boeing YC-14 72-1873
August 12 - Aermacchi MB-339 I-NOVE
August 13 - Bell 222 N9988K
August 27 - PZL-Mielec M-18 Dromader

October
October 10 - Embraer EMB 121 Xingu PP-ZXI
October 12 - Sikorsky S-72 NASA545

November
November 7 - Dassault Falcon 50 F-WAMD

December
December 1 - Ahrens AR 404 N404AR
December 16 - Shuttle Carrier Aircraft NASA905
December 22 - Ilyushin Il-86 CCCP-86000

Entered service

January
January 21 - Concorde, with British Airways and Air France

August
August 24 - Shorts 330 with Time Air

November
Hawker Siddeley Hawk T1 with RAF