PAGHAM HARBOUR

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 29, 3 August 1939, Page 16

PAGHAM HARBOUR

EMPIRE FLYING-BOAT BASE

The scheme for making Pagham Harbour, near Selsey, the principal Ei .pire flying-boat base is not to be opposed, I learn, from one of the directions from which opposition was expected, writes Major C. C. Turner in the "Daily Telegraph and Morning Post."

The Southern Railway Company informs me that the report to the effect that it would oppose it is incorrect, although it is true that it, has been put to some expenditure for the Imperial Airways base at Southampton.

The visit of two naval officers to the site the other day gave rise locally to a rumour that the Admiralty was considering the possibility of using the site for the Fleet Air Arm, but I have been informed at the Admiralty that the visit has no signficance of this kind, and, in fact, that it was "unofficial."

When the proposal was laid before the Air Ministry an estimate of the cost of improving the harbour, of dredging, of the cost of the land, of buildings, and all other necessary work was formed. The figure was about £830,000.

A large area of fiat land on the north side could, at very small cost, be conditioned as a land aerodrome.

Pagham Harbour, without enlargement, would, give a take-off run of a mile in nearly all directions, and by removing part of the disused railway embankment d the south-west corner the length of the run would be increased '■* 1% miles.

The proposed works would turn the harbour into a tidal lake, with a depth of about 10ft.

Provision of the best possible base for Empire flying-boats is clearly a matter of national interest, with an important bearing, on defence; and in the-circumstances it would appear to be advisable to carry out the work without delay. The cost, moreover, need not jiecessarily fall entirely upon the Air Ministry Civil Aviation Department.

Another site has been suggested. South-east of Southampton there is a considerable V.traet r of i. low-lying land which, it is -stated, could'be flooded with the aid of local streams.