Vecihi Hürkuş (6 January 1896 – 16 July 1969) was a Turkish aviation engineer and aviation pioneer. He built Turkey's first aircraft, the Vecihi K-VI. Born in Istanbul, Hürkuş graduated from the Tophane Art School and later joined the Ottoman Army in the Balkan Wars in 1912. Upon his return from the wars, he became the commander of a prisoner-of-war camp in Beykoz. In 1914, he was sent to Baghdad as a mechanic in the Mesopotamia campaign. He was sent back to Istanbul in 1916 after suffering minor injuries in a crash. He was trained to become a pilot and, together with captain Şükrü Koçak, became one of the first two Turkish pilots to shoot down another plane. He was taken prisoner by Russian forces in 1917 after making an emergency landing and was confined in a camp in Nargin, from which h