A TASMAN CROSSING

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 70, 23 March 1920, Page 6

A TASMAN CROSSING

Many of tho great trade routes have been attacked lately by the newlyarrived aviator. He has flown the Atlantic, .has -traversed Europe from end to end, gone by way of the Near East to India and Burma, the East Indies, and .Australia; has travelled from north to south of Africa, and is now trying to conquer the obstacle of the "unchanging East" itself. But so far tho Tasman Sea has heard little more than the distant ■thunder of the flying engine. Its thou-sand-mile stretch of water offers a silent challenge to the flying men of Australia and New Zealand; and undoubtedly they are stirred. - Australian aviators have done great things in "blazing the. trail" for long-distance flying. The trans-Tas-man flight plainly offers'an oppoi'tunity for New Zealand to claim its place in the enterprise. There are, we feel sure, men in New Zealand who could make the flight if they had a suitable machine; but to look for a man who has the necessary ability and the necessary machine in his possession would be. absurd. Machine and funds must be provided, and the aviator invited to use them. ■

The Postmaster-General, states thai there is at present no suitable machine in New Zealand. For such a big flight, an aeroplane must have a powerful engine, partly to give high speed, but more to give the lifting power required to carry enough fuel to last for twelve hours or more. But this difficulty may be got over easily enough. The Imperial Government last year offered New Zealand, .with the other Dominions, a. hundred aircraft. Sir James Allen stated recently that it was proposed to accept thirty-five of these. No hint has been given yet of the Government's propose? policy on aviation; but any policy of a useful character should provide for possessing some aircraft of high power. Sir John Alcock crossed the Atlantic in a war-type Vickers-Virny : Sir RossSmith's flight to Australia was made in a similar machine. In fact, it is generally true that the flying machine, as the war left it was^practically as good as the-flying machine of to-day. The lack of a suitable machine, then, is hardly to be argued as an insuperable obstacle to a trans-Tasman flight. After the man and the machine, the expense. The flight itself, and its preliminaries.vmuat be paid for; and the aviator must be paid comniensiirately with the risk he runs. There should be little difficulty in meeting the cost of such a venture, either by a Government grant or by private generosity, when the object is clearly a benefit to the State.