A WOMAN'S FLIGHT OVER LONDON

North Otago Times, Volume CIV, Issue 13662, 2 September 1916, Page 7

A WOMAN'S FLIGHT OVER LONDON

"LOOPING THE LOOP." MILE- AND A-HALF-ABOVE HYDE PARK. , The following account of a trip over London in a military.aeroplane is contributed to the New York Tribune by Miss Jane Anderson, who'recently described the return to port of a British submarine which had been badly damaged in collision with'a mine:— In. a British military aeroplane, painted black, and. designed for pursuing Zeppelins at night, 1 Hew across London yesterday, and'at a height of 7000 ft looped the loop over Hyde Park. It, was through the courtesy of the War Office that 1 ffas permitted to make this flight, to'-start from one of Britain's finest:aerodromes and see, spread in a clear, coloured panorama, oho mile and .a-lialf below me, the houses and the streets of the greatest city in. the. world. .In the-great-field'from, which 1 started the turf was broken by'patches' of black mud, and the grass was beaten down-by .the heavy, rain of the morning. On the wooden runway, with her wheels blocked aud her black planes silhouetted -against, the sky, a. biplane was waiting. . She was beautiful—this '■machine.-.But it was plain'that she was not the product.of peace,,'' It was not her great ■ black wings, it was not her black, compact, fusiiage, wbic'h set her apart irrevocably for the purposes of war, for the purposes of death. It was, instead, a little emblem painted on the under side of her upper surface, It was

rain fed- in pure whty',. this emblem, fhe lines of it were clean and broad, ;t was a death's head—skull and crossMines.

I climbed aboard, and was strapped in. The observer's seat,' where I sat, was a wide seat and the i'usijagc formed my arm rests,-There was.plenty of foot space. Captain X, who-..was 'my pilot, got ■.into • his seat behind' me. To '. my right, almost above nie, the death's head looked on.. , A Dive Into The Sky.

We circled the Held, headed into' the wind, and were off. I mean we dived up into the sky. Now,! have seen'getaways; that is, I have watched the sm'coth and tranquil lifting of machines from the earth, ami the steady, upward climbing into the clouds. But we didn't do this. When we left the ground wc left it. It was good climbing. It was good and stiff. The black nose of tho biplane pointed straight to the sun. Then, after a slow, circular climb Captain X headed her toward London, And Iknew that there could have been no belter choice in my pilot. 1 looked down.' Below me I saw, in one vast, endless cyclorama, the roofs and grey streets of ut city with a rivvr bounding .them. The roofs were a deep lustreless purple. In the distance I saw a little grey disc, faintly outlined. This was St. Paul's. 'I was flying above the City of London. As far as J could see on every side of me' were roofs—more and more roofs of houses. I do not think that ever before I had understood the meaning of a city, of this tremendous focusing ,of labour, of intention, of design. Therewas such au impression of unification,-, of such vast concentration of effort. And in each one of those houses there were people who were taking part in -tliis-gix , at,']ie\\^orJsiiVoJ.'.;,thi^yk!id,.-. ,^iis l ■ city was London."This city-was the centre and the source' of 'flie' poftcr of ; England; this city was .dictating the destiny of thousands upon thousands of human .beings, who were lighting for the integrity and the endurance of their nation.

And I thought, suddenly, of the aircraft of tjic eiicmy which are sent upon occasion to wreak vengcauce upou London. J saw, for the first time, this undertaking in its 'true'proportions. In the dear daylight! could distinguish no individual house, no block of houses, no s'rects, no avenues. Certainly darkness, that extraordinary darkness of Loudon at night, would not have helped inc. I understood why the raids of the enemy 'had met with such meagre success. And I knew that however much energy and -effort might lie expended upon it, lhat.no vital destruction would ever repay it. The immensity of London was its own armour, I was impressed with the futility of any effort to overcome it, with the hopelessness of attempting to make any' appreciable mark upon that endless affiliation of grey roofs,. '■■ Hurdling a Cloud. < However, at this moment Captain X saw a cloud not too far -above us, and started climbing again. I am not -sure just how much that one particular cloudhad to do with our sudden new ascent, but we went up there just seven thousand feet above the heart of-Loudon, and, although it was'riot at all what I had expected to do, -ive. jumped that cloud.. ■•■ I '

When .we started up I do not know what I thought we wore attempting; but this is what we did—we bore down upon that cloud,- and when it was just before us, small, round, opaque, my pilot throttled his motor, We dropped, We dropped precipitately. It was rather a sensation, this sliding off toward earth. And 1 missed the pleasant loud roar of the engine, We were diving a bit fast.

Then Captain X threw on .the motor to full speed and brought her back to an even keel, Then—we sailed ifp and hurdled -'lie cloud, It was very, well done, It was a good, clean lift. We did not even so much 1 as touch the smooth white edge of that cloud. Below, suddenly, a big strip of green appeared in the middle of London. With' that curious loss of a sense of distance and of motion /which is legitimate enough in Hying, I did not know what this green square-wa3. I had been watching the roofs, which seemed to ha i- e darkened as wo progressed; iu some places they seemed wholly to have disappeared, This was because'the roofs of London are black with smoke ami grime.

, But Captain X explained about that strip of green which was interrupting the grey streets of the city. First, he hammered on the irou easing of the fusilage. I turned round. Ho made a quick, gesture, reaching out towards me. I didn't know what he wanted. Then I saw thai the captain was handing me. .'i scrap of while paper, folded, about Midsize of a slamp. It was a letter. Written on it, in pencil, were two sentences:—

'.'\Vi: are over Hyde Park. Would you like to loop over London,'" I luriiod around so Hint I could set him, and nodded. "Looping" Over Hyde Park.

The machine plunged headlong toward I lit- earth. The motor was running; full blast. The world rushed up to-mee't Us. Then the world rushed away again. I found myself staring at the'nose of 'he machine, which was straight above, ller piston rods. a. row of them on either side, were dancing up anil down briskly, I saw lliem, and I saw the roof of the sky—vol I had not moved, d.was still sitting, slating straight ahead. Only I was, staring at the sky instead of the earth. Everything was'moving, Hyde, I'ark wasn't where it- ought to have been. The sky was not right. The nose of the machine was over.my head. The planes were ponb. All wrong. Then a

slice of earth dislodged itself, and, making circles, slood on end. And another section of- the earth rushed into it. ] saw this myself. There were some trees mixed up in it. 1 don't know wheii this was. But 1 saw it all.

How did 1 feci* 1 felt nothing. It was not my affair if the world was determined upon separating itself into portions and colliding. J was in some new world where the- blue immensity, had substance, where men in machines of their own making set themselves in defiance of all laws of space, and time, and proportion. In my arms, and in the tips of my lingers, the blood was hammering; 1 had an impression that this was happening to somebody else. The roar of Ihe engine deafened me. 1 wondered why it made so much noise. A lot of tubes and cylinders and bolls and things. And London breaking up ill bits and whirling off into space.

Then the nose of the machine came down in front of me where it should have been, And the iron strip on it wa3 shaking again, and the two thin cables on my left were vibrating pleasantly. I looked over and assured myself that Hyde Park was down below. It Was. I liked the world, '

So I'd looped the loop in a British biplane. 1 had plunged full'speed toward the earth: I had come straight up again toward the sky; then I'd described a full circle against the grey roof of the universe. It was'done.

• I turned and saw the captain, leaning out over his wind-shield. He, was smiling; smiling aud fumbling' with his goggles. Something, it seemed, had gone, wrong with them. So far as I could ?ec, this was the only mark of our having been upside 'down, And it was set right straightway. ■ . Ft>r immediately we started turning. The captain banked her very prettily, and I' saw .the little paths" of Hyde Park between the planes. Somehow it gave them a. wonderful perspective, this looking down the full length of the black wings. And so we came back, oyer houses and white streets, to the wide sweep of the, river. iWe headed toward the aerodrome. Above the patch of grey, which was the roof of the sheds, two white planes wero circling. And high above a dark line of .trees a big ungainly kiie-bojioon hovered, almost motionless. Evidences of war,'

We dropped down, spiralling. It was a- double spiral Captain X made and a particularly beautiful one.. Ceriainlv the choice; of ray..pilot had been a -food one. And certainly our landing, like our flight, was full evidence of the superb construction of his Majesty's war biplane, designed for the destruction of enemy aircraft. .1 had had full opportunity of discovering whatever weakness or fallibility would have lieen i" her, 'I had found none.