GIANT AIR LINERS

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 71, 24 March 1926, Page 10

GIANT AIR LINERS

TWELVE DAYS TO AUSTRALIA.

(From Our Own .Correspondent)

LONDON, 26th January. Airships capable of^ comfortably accommodating' 100 ' passengers, and their baggage, and of crossing from England to Australia within ten or twelve days,, wer» spoken of as a possibility of thtverv near future by Air Vice-Marshal Sir BBrancker in a lecture delivered'By him at the Overseas League on "Air Transport and the Empire." .; He mentioned that ;two big airships were , on order, and that they would bciised in the first place to establish expeimieit.-1 services with India. These ships, h« < (tiu, should cross at' about 65:;miles. ah hour, and would have the capacity above referred to. -There would be; two-berth sleeping cabing, a dining saloon which would seat fifty persons at a time, a lounge which would accommodate air the passengers. Unfortunately, economy was in the wind, and the progress in the construction of these airships might be'very considerably delayed. They were intendeji to go as far as Karachi, and if the experimental services proved a. success then undoubtedly arrangements would be made to continue the journeys to-Australia, the total voyage taking from ten to twelve days. During the past six years British commercial aviators''had1 flown Borne SjQOO.OOO miles, and there had only been five fatal accidents."' Tlie ' expe»'se ' of' air> transport ' was also decreasing, and once we'had got all-metal aircraft, which was within-our reach, charges' would! dropi':still-'further. Tho' c'ross-Chariricl services had always been looked upon as a form'of experiment.''They were experiments from which Should be learned lessons that would be applied, to thejmperial air routes. Our naturalgravitation was towards the Erist. England had started a Cairo-Ktirachi service, and Australia had already started to meet her. The meeting would probably" take-plac* eventually at Sinjapor«..\ ■'■ ■■ '-