BENEATH THE WINDSOCK

Evening Star, Issue 21931, 18 January 1935, Page 2

BENEATH THE WINDSOCK

[By Gypsy Moth.] PILOTS AND PLANES. Application forms for pilots’ A license are to hand, and may be obtained from the pilot instructor. Two interesting visitors to the airport recently were 1' lying-officer Dennehy, on leave from the Royal Air Force, and Captain C. Roberts,, late of the Canadain Air Force. Both these officers hired and piloted a club plane for local flights. Pilot G. Harvey took one of the Moths up to .11.000 ft recently so that he could “ get a good view of the country,” as he said. BUSY AERODROMES. Aviation made such rapid strides in England during 1934 that it is not surprising to find great activity at a London aerodrome. An aerodrome has become the starting point to almost any part of the world, and aeroplanes come in daily from equally as far —500. miles or 5,000, it is practically the same to the traveller by air. The spick and span appearance of an aeroplane belies the distance it has travelled, and apart from actually questioning the pilot one could never guess correctly. Travellers who have flown across three or four countries on a long journey walk out of the cabin on arrival as unconcernedly as if they had been on a short bus trip. There is no limit to the scope of the airwavs.

The comparative freedom under which an aerial system of transport operates, compared with its earthbound rivals, is responsible for a neverending variety, not only in the journeys themselves, but in the scope of useful work performed. At Croydon, for instance, regular summer and _ winter schedules are flown in the daytime and at nisjht. When the holiday rush is on the air services are affected in exactly the same way as the older methods of' transport, and extra aeroplanes have to be put on, just as more cranages are added to trains or additional boats used to supplement ferry services. Croydon is the departure point from England for any large place on the Continent, and, while Imperial Airways serve a great many countries, it would not be possible for one company to do all the work. The Dutch line. K.L.M., with its high-wing Fokker monoplanes; the German line, Lufthansa, with low-wing Junker monoplanes; the Belgian line, 5.A.8.E.N.A.; and the French line, Air France, all utilise Croydon as a terminal point. In addition to the foreign activities, inland airlines carrying passengers and mail between main centres have augmented the traffic to quite an extent; Railway Air Services were first brought into operation on August 20 last, and it is now possible to book a comfortable seat on four-engined express airliners from London to Birmingham, Manchester, Belfast, and Glasgow. Excursions in travel have always proved popular witli the public, and it is no wonder that one sees capacity aeroplanes taking off for week-end trips to places across the English'Channel. Aviation has proved' its tremendous superiority over surface transport under most conditions, but never to a greater extent than in a short sea crossing involving tedious changes. Who would have thought five years ago that the sea ferry from Portsmouth to the Isle of Wight would be seriously rivalled by efficient air ferries, running every hour? . Vet this is the case, and one can buy a return jticket for a few shillings.

NOT A “ FLYING CHAUFFEUR.” In his appearance before the Howell Board in Washington (writes L. 1). Lyman, in the 1 New York Times’) Colonel Lindbergh pretty well disposed of a theory which certain men interested financially in air transport have been quoted as holding. Briefly they say that because of the increase in the efficiency and safety of passenger aeroplanes. because of the aids offered by radio and increasingly better weather reporting services, the air line pilot will soon become little more than an air chauffeur, a bus driver of the air, or at best a railway engineer of the air.The pilots themselves hold that in their position they are more like the skipper of a passenger vessel at sea, with this difference; An officer of a

marine ..vessel can look forward to twenty, thirty, or perhaps forty years of service, whereas a pilot must expect fifteen years at the outside to be his limit of active service, with the average much lower than that.

COLONEL LINDBERGH’S VIEWS, With transoceanic aeroplane service close at hand, with aeroplanes for such a service growing in size and range, Colonel Lindbergh says: “ It seems to me that we can look forward to having probably at least two-crews on a large aeroplane within the next few years, one crew to relieve the other and possibly to sleep on the aeroplane while it is in flight, “ Certainly that would be essential on transoceanic routes, which I believe are not far away. Of course, it should be recognised that if an aeroplane is up in the air for twenty or twenty-four hours there should be more than one shift,” states a writer in the ‘ New York Times.’

Colonel Lindbergh declined to suggest the amount of salary a pilot should receive. It varied with experience and other factors, lie said. He did. however, - say that he holds an entirely different viewpoint of the duties of the pilot of to-day and the future from that expressed by those of the “air chauf« i feiir school.”

“ The pilot who is in command of * modern air liner.” he said, “ and particularly of the latest flying boats and also land aeroplanes, must have a very high degree of skill and experience. He should be one of our most experienced pilots available. “ I think if he is not a graduate engineer that he should have a large amount of engineering training. _ Possibly he should he a graduate engineer. He must be highly skilled in navigation and other fields, especially in the technical fields of aviation.”

With the description of a senior pilot’s duties Colonel Lindbergh showed the differences between such a Job and the work of a younger pilot flying on a short feeder line.

He agreed with operators and other pilots on the possibility—or lack of it—of using parachutes as an aid to passenger safety. “I do not believe they would increase the safety of passenger travel," he said. “We have studied that very carefully, particularly in relation to the accidents that have occurred in the past, and almost without exception T believe that parachutes would not have prevented those accidents or saved the lives involved in them. “In most instances the accidents have happened so quickly that there would not have been time to use parachutes even with trained personnel. I am firmly of the opinion that to-day the equipment of passenger aeroplanes with parachutes would, if anything, increase the hazard through their improper use. Parachutes on military aeroplanes, test aeroplanes, or on single motor mail aeroplanes. 1 think, are very desire’*V. hut I do not believe they are in any way desirable for passenger aeroplanes in their present state of development^