NEW AUTOGIRO

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 301, 20 September 1928, Page 11

NEW AUTOGIRO

FLIES ACROSS ENGLISH CHANNEL IN CHARGE OF INVENTOR A VERTICAL DESCENT (United Press Association.—By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) (British Official Wireless.) Rugby, September 18. Senor de la Cierva to-day made a flight across the English Channel in the autogiro which lie has invented. He has been touring Britain in it, and is now going to exhibit it on the Continent. Starting from Croydon, he crossed the Channel from Lympne to Cape Grisnez and landed at Saint Inglevert, near Boulogne. Spectators of the flight were greatly interested in the machine, which presented a strange appearance alongside an Air Union liner' and Moth aeroplane, which escorted it. The autogiro combines the features of the helicopter or vertical ascent machine and the ornithopter or machine that flaps its wings like a bird. In the parlance of the aerodrome it is a windmill ’plane. It does not glide into the air, but darts after only a short run and, when it descends, it comes down so straight that the airman gets the sensation of heading for a crash. It is thought that this sensation will require some overcoming. IMPORTANT DEVELOPMENT IN AVIATION MACHINE GIVES NO TROUBLE TO PILOT (Australian Press Association.) London, September 18. Aviation critics in Britain and France agree that de la Cierva’s autogiro is the most revolutionary aeronautical development in recent years It is described as a windmill because, instead of having fixed wings like an aeroplane, it has four horizontally rotating vanes. Its cross-Channel flight is described as important as Bleriot’s in 1909. The autogiro reached Cape Grisnez one hour after leaving Croydon. Descents were voluntarily made at St. Inglevert and Abbeville for refreshment, instead of making a single hop from Croydon to Paris, where two thousand people welcomed the inventor, after a four-minute descent so vertical that the machine did not move three yards when it landed. Senor de la Cierva made a statement that the flight was the greatest experience of his lifetime. He found no trouble in controlling either height or speed. He rose to an altitude of 600 metres in three minutes, and averaged 100 miles an hour during the flight.