AIR SPEED RECORD

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 239, 9 October 1935, Page 5

AIR SPEED RECORD

MILLIONAIRE FLYER.

FRENCHMAN'S TIME

BETTERED.

DEATH ESCAPED IN MISHAP,

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

LOS ANGELES, September 17,

Howard Hughes, millionaire sport flyer, missed death by a narrow margin a few seconds after he brought back to the United States the world's speed mark for land aeroplanes when he averaged 347 miles an hour near Santa Ana, Southern California.

Official confirmation of tho new mark must await calibration _of the speed over the measured three-kilometre course, bordering the Lddio Martin Aiiport, by the Federation Aeronautic Internationale of Paris, France. The figures will be submitted after a conference between officials of the National Aeronautics Association and representatives of the California Institute of Technology.

"I don't expect any difficulty in having Hughes' speed marks officially allowed," said William R. Lnyart, official timer, shortly after the "mystery" racing 'plane made a forced landing in a beet field and ploughed a furrow for 60 yards.

Hughes liad just completed his seventh | lap against the former world record ofj 314.319 miles an hour, held by Raymond Delmotte, of France, when he suddenly lifted his silver monoplane into the air as his fourteen-cylinder Wasp radial aircooled engine sputtered. The pilot sought altitude, climbing to 500 feet. Then he turned and headed! for the beet field, his engine stopped. Despite his landing speed of about 80 miles an hour, Hughes made a perfect "dead stick" landing as the ship flattened out on its lower side and s!l4 through the soft ground. A bent propeller and wrenched landing gear were the only visible damage.

Petrol Supply Exhausted. "My petrol supply in one tank was exhausted," Hughes said as he stepped unhurt from the racer. "When I switched on the other tank the motor didn't take it. An air lock—pressure built up from the dry tank —had developed in the line, and the only thing I could do was attempt a forced landing." Hughes received the congratulations of numerous officials gathered to witness the assault on the speed record for his j manipulation of the speedy ship and tho perfect landing. "The stoppage in gas came so suddenly," Hughes said, "that I did not have time to lower the retractable landing gear. It was only partially down when the 'plane hit. The force drove it back into the ship and probably aided 1 in preventing additional damage." Six record-breaking tests were mado as Hughes streaked over the course. An electric chronograph photographed and clocked each flight. Four were required officially to set a new speed mark. Expensive Machine. Hughes rolled his 120,000 dollar j 1000 liorse-power, low-winged monoplane from tho hangar at Union Air Terminal shortly after daylight and awaited word from officials at the measured course that all was in readiness. At 0.30 a.m. he flashed into the air, and an hour and lon minutes later had made his successful seven flights when halted by the petrol supply stoppage. Hughes and associates announced that the next speed record he would attempt to break in his specially constructed racer would be the flight from Los Angeles to New York. The present time of i 0 hours and two minutes is held by Colonel Roscoe Turner, who was a contestant in the London to Melbourne Con- ! tennial race.

The record-breaking flight was mad* over the course 011 the Irvine ranclj surveyed for the late Dr. Albert AJ Michelson's experiments to measure the speed of light. Joseph Nikrent and \V. If. Hitchman, representing the National Aeronautic Association, helped to time the dashes, gfn beating the Delmotto record by approximately 2!) miles an hour Hughes 'brought back to America the record once held by the late .James Wedell, who set a mark of 490.8 kilometres an hour, onlv to have it bettered by tli French flyer on December 24 I last-