THE PIONEER FLIGHT

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXXI, Issue 12398, 10 November 1934, Page 9

THE PIONEER FLIGHT

FIFTEEN YEARS AGO

HEAVY HANDICAPS.

The big. air race calls to mind at once the first flight made from England to Australia fifteen years ago. The difficulties of the old flight compared with the, difficulties of the present. event, . the hardships. ...suffered and the short, duration of the then wonderful non-stop flights, are cause for amazement nowadays.

Starting from Hounslow, England, on November 12, 1919, Sir Ross and Sir Keith Smith, made their way, in a Vickers-Vimv .’plane, through a snowstorm to Lyons. On a perfect day they travelled toward Marseilles, over Cannes and Monte Carlo up the Riviera and across the Gulf of Genoa. They landed at Pisa, where they got bogged and were forced to stay a day on. account of bad weather. With much difficulty they took off from the. swampy ground and landed at Romo the same afternoon. They then went to . Taranto, over Corfu, where,- to quote Sir Ross Smith’s words, “Kaiser Bill once possessed a nice palace,” and on to the coast of Alorca, just above the Gulf of Corinth.

OVER OLD BATTLEFIELDS. Here the airmen ran into a rainstorm which was so severe that they had to sit with their heads down until late in the afternoon. The had weather continued up till their arrival in Crete. Although it was still raining they set off for Cairo next day and arrived there after “a nonstop fight of seven and a-balf hours.” The next day they set off for Palestine, again running into rain. Sir Ross Smith wrote that “it was most interesting flying over the places fi'own. over during the war. It brought back numerous memories.” They landed at Damascus and started for Baghdad, again in the rain, next day. But. owing to head winds, they got no further than Ramadie. , Here the ’plane was tied down facing the wind, but the direction changed, a control wire was broken by the gale, and the airmen had to turn-out and hang on to their machine.' ' The control wire was-mended and they flew to Basra, “passing over Kut and other battlefields of the Mesopotamia campaign.” They overhauled their machine and set out for Bunder Abbas, landing there “after a flight of eight hours,” and went on to Karachi, “which was reached after a journey of eight and a-hnlf hours.” Next day they “flew over the Sind Desert and Rajputana and landed at Delhi alter a non-stop run of nine hours.” Sir Ross Smith wrote that “during the last three days we had travelled from Basra to Delhi, a distance of 1600 miles, and spent 25J hours out of 54 in the air.”

STUMP-STREWN LANDING FIELD

They were all so tired and fatigued from this journey that they (decided to have a day’s rest before flying Allahabad. From Allahabad they proceeded to Calcutta, whore they had lunch. The same day they flew over Akyab,- where they noticed -M.. Pomlet’s ’plane, on their'way to Rangoon. M. Poulct had left Paris a month bef.ore them. ■

They stopped at Bangkok and atSengora. Of the landing at Scngora Sir Ross Smith wrote: “By the greatest good fortune we found after landing that the stumps of trees were still lying on the ground, which we had fortunately missed on landing, and which were enough to crush us.” Here again they had to turn out. and hang on to:their ’ ’plane during a storm. The next day they were delayed by what Sir Ross described as “the heaviest rain I have seen in my whole life.” The state of the aerodrome was so had that 200 convicts were sent from the local gaol to clear a.path for the fliers to get off again. But “the convicts made a had job of,the cleaning up,” the ’plane splashed through water 6 inches deep and much difficulty was experienced in rising for the flight to Kalidjatti, Java.

BOGGED TO THE 1 LOWER PLANES. At Sourabaya the machine sank up to the axles in mud, and it took 200 coolies to get it out again. In trying to taxi on to harder ground they again sank to the lower planes. To surmount the difficulty a road of bamboo mats, 300 yards in length, was built, but some of the mats flew up and caught in the tail and they were once more badly b-ogged. The toad was rebuilt 50yds, longer, with the, mats laced together, and they, succeeded in getting off with bamboo flying in all directions from the propellers. From Bisma they went to Timor whence they crossed the sea to Port Darwin, landing on. December 10. On December 10 they had been missing for a day and much anxiety was caused, but they turned up atAnthony Downs on December 17 with a damaged propeller. The flight ended at Cbarleville, Queensland, on December 26, 1919, owing to a broken -crank arm being irreplaceable in Australia. ■ During the visit of* the Prince of AVales to Sydney in 1920 Sir Ross Smith fell into the. harbor in a De

(Continued in Next Column.)

Havilland ’plane which developed engine trouble. Ho was: lucky to escape 'unhurt. V; While flying a--Vickers-Viking built for a round-the-world flight, Sir Ross Smith was killed at Brooklands on April 13, 1922. Sir Keith Smith, his brother pilot on the famous flight is still living. He is- familiar to New /Zealanders through the lectures on their flight which he delivered at various towns in the Dominion.