THOUSAND PILOTS

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 125, 22 November 1935, Page 5

THOUSAND PILOTS

FOR BRITAIN'S AIR FORCE

Flight instructors are at a heavy premium. The training of about 1000 Royal Air Force pilots in the year ending next April is severely taxing available resources, writes Major C. C. Turner in the "Daily Telegraph." In addition to the new civil flying schools which, under contract with tht: Air Ministry, are to provide initial instruction, and five new regular Air Force flight-training schools to be formed before March, the increase in civil flying is imposing heavy demands. Moreover, many Air Force officers and men who would in normal times be leaving the service, and would provide some of the needed staffs, are extending their terms of service. Three of the civil flying schools under the scheme were to be opened in November—the Phillips and Powis, near Reading; a de Havilland, near Maidenhead; and Reid and Sigrist, at Desford. Four were in existence before the expansion scheme, and two others, Hanworth and Sywell, have been opened since. Four more are to be opened early next year. At each civil school, forty or fifty pupils will be under instruction. The work of providing hangars, offices, and sleeping accommodation is proceeding to schedule. When the scheme is in full swing, there will be, in addition to the Central Flying School, eleven regular Air Force flight training schools and thirteen civil schools supplying the Air Force. The training aircraft are already being supplied. At the de Havilland works alone, nearly eighty "Tiger" Moths are waiting to be sent out, as accommodation becomes ready for them. That this, perhaps the most difficult side of the expansion scheme, has sol far been carried out is, in itself, some-j thing of a triumph. There is little doubt that the difficulty as to instructors will be overcome by the time they can be absorbed.

The instructors have to be approved by the Air Ministry, and not the slightest relaxation in the high standard imposed will be permitted. Short-service officers who join under the new conditions are commissioned as acting pilot-officers on probation, from the date of joining the Air Force depot, Uxbridge. Their rank is confirmed after twelve months' service, including the period spent at the civil flying school. A large number of noncommissioned pilots are als& being enlisted.