FIRST FLYING BOMB

Greymouth Evening Star, 17 September 1945, Page 6

FIRST FLYING BOMB

STORY OF THE LARYNX.' Britain had a flying bomb in 1927, and a very, good flying-bomb, too. After three years’ experiment the idea was dropped for fear an. enemy country might learn its secrets, and work on similar lines. Lord Cherwell mentioned the bomb briefly in the- House of Lords. The machine, the Larynx, was a terrific technical advance, and was designed to be mas-produced at £2oo'. I can now disclose details of its performance and tell why the Air Force Staff' decided to discontinue this branch of flying, says the Sunday Despatch air correspondent. The story began in 1925, two years before Lindbergh flew the Atlantic and 11 years before the first Hurricane made its test flights at Brooklands. Our big bombers were then ridiculously slow. The Air Staff.put out what is known as a “Requirement” for a flying-bomb—a pilotless machine which would fly and keep its course for 200 miles without outside aid. which would be as fast as the best’fighters, and a good deal faster than piloted bombers. The Royal Aircraft Establishment at Marnbdrough got down to the job and produced the first machine by 1927. The specification called for 180 m.p.h. The Larynx fleW at 200 m.p.h. It was controlled by. ordinary magnetic compass, just like the flying-bombs which fell on London 17 years later. The Larynx was a mid-wing monoplane, with a span of only 13ft Gin. The power plant was a 200 h.p. Armstrong-Siddeley Lynx, of seven cylinders. Brief secret flights were made with the Larynx and its successors oveideserted parts of the Bristol Channel. Then in 1929 machines and spares were sent to Iraq for fullscale tests over the desert. The machine could carry a warhead of 2501 b. Plans were made for a 400 m.p.h. model, but in 1930 the work was dropped and the brilliant scientists and engineers were switched to radio-controlled aircraft.