“An Aerial Hotel”

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 25 October 1934, Page 5

“An Aerial Hotel”

American Machine and Dutch Pilots THE BIG DOUGLAS PLANE. K. D. Parmentier and. J. J. Moll, the Dutchmen, are pilots of Iv.L.M. (Royal Dutch Airlines), which runs the excellent service between Amsterdam and Batavia along the route offering such difficulties as dust storms and monsoons. Parmentier is the night-flying and blind-flying speciaist of the company. Recently he went through a special course of training, flying on every night route in the United States. Moll is experienced and capable. He was on the Abel Tasman, a Dutch mail ’plane which flew from Holland to Australia some years ago. The Douglas machine which they are flying is used on the fastest commercial schedule across the United States. Anthony Fokker, the renowned designer, recently secured the rights to build this machine on licence in Europe. He was so impressed with it that he declared it made him ashamed of “the clumsy crates” which he had made famous as Fokkers.

The Douglas is a -low-winged monoplane with two engines and an undercarriage which folds back into the machine in flight, to reduce head reresistance. Its cruising speed is given at 200 miles an hour, but in tests it carried a load of passengers at 250 miles an hour in a short cross-country flight. The Douglas has been called “an aerial hotel.” In its normal form the machine carries two pilots and 12 passengers, but the internal lay-out-can be altered to provide for 18 passengers. There is a. buffet with facilities for serving meals in flight, and the passenger cabin has ventilating and heating systems. There is a large cargo and mail locker behind the passen.'jrer cabin.

The K.L.M. service is the fastest between Europe and the Far East. From London or Amsterdam to Bagdad is only two and a-half days, to Calcutta five, to Singapore seven, and to Batavia seven and a-half. New machines which will be put on the route will reduce the time to Java to six days or less.