US Army's first airplane

The Wright military aircraft approaches a pylon in a demonstration flight, there seems to be a definite lack of military uniforms in the audience.

Signal Corps Specification Number 486 was issued December 23 1907 to provide the US Army with its first heavier-than-air aircraft. Requirements were as follows:

It must be easily assembled and disassembled so that an army wagon could transport it. that it be able to carry two people with a combined weight of 350 lbs, and must carry sufficient fuel for 125 miles,  it be able to reach a speed of at least 40 mph which would be calculated during a two lap test flight over a 5 mile course,  that it would be able to demonstrate that it could remain in the air for at least 1 hour. 

The Wright brothers provided a wooden framed aircraft with a 25 hp engine driving two propellers, landing gear was two skids. it actually doesn't appear much different than the original 1903 model. 

The aircraft was demonstrated in September 1908. On one flight a propeller split, the airplane glided down to a height of 75 feet and then crashed to the ground, killing passenger Thomas Selfridge. 

The Wrights returned with a new plane in June 1909 and over the next two months it was demonstrated adequately and accepted. New army pilots were trained during the course of the next few months.