NIGHT FLYING IN PEACE TIME

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 123, 18 February 1919, Page 4

NIGHT FLYING IN PEACE TIME

(By "A Pilot,'' in the "Daily Mail.") Night-bombing experience during ths war will be of great assistance, in organising Great Britain's oommercial fly* ins in time of peace. Night travelling will be carried out in the air in the same way as it carried, on bytrain and boat. In the first place long journeys occupying several days, as from London to Melbourne, Peking, Tokio, or Cape Town, will not be interrupted' by darkness. The machines will fly into the dusk, through the stars and the dim hours of night, till morning greets the pilot. In the second place, business men travelling on a short journey, such as from London to Christiania or Home, will take,advantage of night fly ing , in order not" to waste hours of daylight on their trip. Leaving London at twilight, they will sleep in a comfortable cabin in the air, and will awake to see dawn gilding the snowy peaks of the Italian Alps. The darkness will be full of signs to the airmen of the night. Every town will have its illuminated landing ground, with a flashing lighthouse visible 60 miles away. The coast-line of England, and of Europe generally, will probably be fringed with searchlight signals, arranged in a thousand different combinations, to act as a guide and also to show the shore-line. These searchlights will have to 'be cloudpenetrating, and will probably be sup. plemented by Wgh-rieing rockets, and perhaps by some variant of the wonderful green-ball", machine used by the Germans, the best, night-iniidint'' devire ?f t n J2i nde, -,- The g F^ n bal 's 'rise to ll.OOOft. and are Visible aid uninistakable 40 or 50 miles away. Aeroplanes flying at night will have to be fitted with powerful navigation lights visible a long way off, and different levels Till have to be allotted to machines going in opposite directions on the sune route. For instance, machines on the London-Paris-Ikle-Rome route may have to fly on the 4000-5000 level going south and the 6000-7000 going north allowance being made for crossing the Alps. The people asleep in cottages and cities will not bn disturbed by the throbbing chant of the wide-winged birds of the darkness as they roar on amid the stars. Night will not be made hideous A few moving lights in the sky; aifew lean sentinel searchlights; a few dronping scarlet and emerald balls of firean rocket shower-these alone will give sign of the busy commerce of the midnight ekies. ■'