LANGUAGE OF THE AIR

Greymouth Evening Star, 19 April 1938, Page 12

LANGUAGE OF THE AIR

( TERMS USED BY AVIATORS Just as the advent of the motor-car ■ introduced several new words' and expressions into our language, so has the age of aerial travel produced its own words and expressions, many of which > I will be as Greek to the layman, says i'a writer in an English, pjaper. Thus, “to boob” is to make l a mis- ‘ take of some kind, more usually “to boob a landing”—that is, to land bad- ; ly. To “give full gun” is to open the ■ throttle to its fullest extent —corresponding to “treading o nthe gas” in I automobile slang. “To lose one’s prop” does 1 not refer to those long forked sticks, with which clotheslines are supported, but means that for some reason or other the pilot hag allowed the motor to stop and the propeller has therefore ceased to revolve. This is alternatively known as “a dead stick.” A “three pointer” is the description applied to a landing so made that both wheels and tail skid touch the ground at the same moment. “Flying by Bradshaw” is another expression in common use. meaning to fly front place to place by following the railway connecting them. Many people will be familiar with the expression “a clock watcher.” In the aviational sense, however, it refers' to one who flies almost entirely by instruments and not instinct, thus watching the “airspeed indicator” or ‘“clock” almost continuously. I “To go into the office” is to duck one's head into the cockpit in order 'more easily to examine the maps. I “Hedge hopping” and' “Contour chasing” are expressions which are I interchangeable, their meaning being practically self-explanatory—to wit, I flying low and skimming over any ; obstacles that may be met 'with, j “Falling out of the sky” is an expression used to denote the vertical descent of an aircraft in landing, caused by stalling the machine a few feet from the ground. The word “stalling” itself may need a little explanation. It denotes the loss of flying speed by an aeroplane, the result of which is that the air has no longer sufficient buoyancy to support the machine.

A member of the “Anti-tilt Brigade” is a. pilot who insufficiently manks his aeroplane when executing turns. A “wind stocking” is the name given to a conical fabric bag used on aerodromes to indicate the direction of the wind. The word “shute” is rather obviously pilots’ slang for parachute. Scarcely any pilot isi ever heard' to refer to the ground as such, it is more usually “the neck.”