WAR IN THE AIR.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIII, Issue 105, 1 May 1909, Page 3

WAR IN THE AIR.

ENGLAND WAKING UP

POSSIBILITIES OF THE

FUTURE

LONDON, March 12.

England is waking up at last, if report speaks truly, to the importance of keeping abreast of the times in aeronautics. The* latest '""news' is that six aeroplanes of the Orville Wright- design are under construction here, and that the Wright Bros. will visit London at the invitation of the War Office, in May. It looks as though the Government has been aroused, and is now prepared to pay for what other nations have produced by inventions and experiments, but one could wish _ that British brains as' well as British gold had had. a share in the splendid achievements now standing to the credit of England's Continental neighbours. Still, if we cannot invent aeroplanes that will iiy, ib is better to buy them than to pretend that they are not worth having. In the Avars of the future they are sure to play an important part, and England cannot afford to be unprepared.

A Royal Artillery officer, Colonel F. G. Stone, drew a grajihic picture

of the possibilities of airships in war, at the lloyal United Service Institute a day or two ago. They would be used," he suggested, for attacks against harbours and dockyards. They would hover over a beleagured fort, reconnoitring the- defences and sending information by wireless telegraphy to ships engaged in bombarding, and they would be able to do a Tittle bombarding on their own account by dropping explosives on areas which could not be effectivelyattacked by ships' guns. At present the only means of defence from such attack?, arc the high-angle batteries, and these can only fire to a maximum heiirht of 7300 feet at a maximum horizontal distance of 4600 yards. These limits naturally place the airship in a commanding position so long as it is beyond the clanger zone, and on a clear day it could reconnoitre in absolute safety.

A STRANGE BATTLE "FIELD."

The Colonel drew a striking picture of the battle-field of the future. Instead of solitary searchlights here and there, he said, there will have to be one blaze of light from all over the area in danger. The aeronaut, hi in dec! by the continual glare, and himself visible to all the defenders below, will have to be sought out by the single search-light, followed by shells from the guns below. "These guns will have to be as nimble as their enemy—light quickfirers with a possible elevation of 70 deer., with a 31b shell so easily exploded that the touch of the gas envelope a& it bit would cause it to burst. Even then, however, the envelope would stand so much laceration that the effective destruction of an airship would be better accomplished by a well-directed shot at the motor or the aeronaut himself. Whatever armament may be employed. Colonel Stone added, an automatic rangenuder is absolutely necessary. But artillery alone will scarcely be able to deny to an enemy's airship such access to the upper air of our harbours and dockyards as may be necessary for reconnoitring and observation. This role can only be satisfactorily filled by harbour airships, or better still, aeroplanes, and the artillery defence in this respect regarded as auxiliary only. So the world may some day read of aerial navies grappling in tho.central blue, after the fashion so_ vividly and powerfully described in Mr H. G. Wells's story, "The War in the Air."