AIR-WAR SPEECH.

Clutha Leader, Volume XLI, Issue 41, 4 December 1914, Page 1

AIR-WAR SPEECH.

PILOTS SIGNAL TO GUNS. THE "STOKMI" i'ETHELS." Among the Allies, probably aLso among tho Gierniaus, a mutual admiration soc.ety is lormed between the artillery and uie airmen plates tin- .Maine correspondent oi tti L . 'Daily Mail'). A now airman s language has sprung up ami there are spe.iai code-. between some ol the Jiauerie-s and iiieir lavorites. iou see a French .aeroplane m>iuo oOUU or (iUUU leel up 111 lioiii oi the artilleiy suddenly .swerve a Mile Lo the leit almost) a s n u were hit. a lew minutes later it .swerves 10 the right M-ightiy, very slightly. 'l'Jie command ant 01 ihe heavy aitillery who ha*> his glares on Inj, "stormy petrel," a peculiarly happy name lor die craft, knows that Uio lust .shot was too lar, the bicond ju.t too .short, 'i here are other signs lor light and Jell divergence.-. Tho Germans work 1110,e elaborately. They have a littie gun which blows a suioko ring, winch stands, the French say, lor objecetive, and means that tho range is right and some French position, to use a liail-iechnical, hali-tsiang French woid much employed, is ' encadre.' Sometimes, too, Taube machines will be used ; and mey cross 0110 another at right angles in order to indicate- tho rignt spot. i' 10111 tiie to]> 01 Lhe 'Times' building in Ae\r York Lhe to]) ol a motionless train way-car iooks as much like a great potato sack us anything else. vv hat must be tue view 01 an airman a 111110 high i" What tho men themselves say i> that all perspective cea.ses. Vou ileal, as it weie, in a sort 01 lounh dimension, and have to learn uircish what h. man or a horse or gun looks like. Tho aeroplauists also begin to learn their parabolas. Air-Dart Mathematics. -Recently a good many bundles of dark> have bren dropped. These curious weajKiite are very uiiely pointed but very heavy behinu the point, lhe tail looked' at 111 sections i h a. cros.s. Tho length is about six inches. Dropped from a heiglu ol a mile they are very alarming and make uounus whil.'k rather battle the burgeon*, liut tho airmen find it very dulicult ui judge tho parabola, for the dart i-t launched, ol course, at whatever pace 1 110 aeioplano is gouig, and it needs both a physicist and mathematician to gauge the lines and length ol the dart 's journey.

Those who shoot at the planes havo also difficult calculations. "Oue generally shoots behind them," ho buid. <- As on© does with driven partridges," I ventured. He laughed aud added that he was a chasseur himself, and made the very sound correction that the aeroplane was more liko a cock pheasant. "One ha# to remember that it carries more behind than m ironi" i and he went on to tell me how manjf feet in front he usually allowed for a Taube travelling at normal height and pace.