IN 12 HOURS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 60, Issue 32, 17 November 1939, Page 8

IN 12 HOURS.

CROSSING THE ATLANTIC. A direct air-mail service, non-stop betAveen London and NeAV York, A\ r as forecast for 1944 by Captain Eddie Rickenbacher, president and general manager of America’s Eastern Aii Lines, says- the London “Daily Telegraph.” Captain Rickenbacher’s 1935 forecasts that there would bo an air-mail service over the Atlantic by way of Bermuda and the Azores in 1937 and that in 1939 or 1940 the North Atlantic service Avould he inaugurated, have both been fulfilled.

“The non-stop flight betAveen London and NeAV York will be possible only, Avhen someone produces an airliner capable of carrying a profitable payload 3000 miles at 300 miles per hour,” he said.

Captain Rickenbacher Avent to England to rencAv contracts Avith oxocutLes of European air lines and lay plans for “a pool of international aviation brains,” aa Inch he hopes to organise for the ‘improvement' of the trans Atlantic air services. Captain Rickenbacher belie A res that in five years Ncav Yorkers Avould be able to reach the heart of London Avithin tAvelve to fifteen hours of leaving, say Times Square. By 1949 this figure Avould be reduced to from eight to ten hours, and no one Avould be astonished to hear that bis neighbour Avas going to the United States for the Aveek-end. On bis return to the United States Captain Rickenbacher Avill try to persuade the Post Office, the civil authorities, and the army and navy to combine and draAV up a programme to encourage. capital and industry to develop a trans Atlantic company. He suggests a plan of co-operation to eliminate the delays and heaA r y costs resulting from individual research by competing countries.