TO INDIA BY AIR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19508, 11 December 1926, Page 10

TO INDIA BY AIR.

The imminence of at least a partial air service Britain and India is indicated by the announcement that the first aeroplane to be used in the run from Cairo to Karachi, via Bagdad, is to leave Croydon one week from to-day. It has never been suggested that the spanning of this distance, largely over desert land, is more than a modest beginning to what is expected to develop in the shape of Empire air communication. Still, when the Imperial Airways Company does commence its regular service from Egypt to India, as it is due to do in January, that first step which counts so much will have been taken. It will, not be merely a speculative venture, this service, for even before it has begun there is assurance of patronage. , As long ago as June last Sir Samuel Hoare said that officers on the North-West Frontier and Indian civilians were booking their passages. The possibility of saving from ten days to a fortnight of their precious leave, which would be spent travelling if the ordinary routes were followed, was proving an irresistible lure. He added his conviction that once the service" was established there would be a strong demand for linking up England with Egypt by air at the one end and Karachi with Bombay, Calcutta, Rangoon and Singapore at the other. This, of course, would mean the saving of even inore time. It would introduce factors not anticipated in the inaugural run, however. On no less authority than the word of Sir Alan Cobham it has been stated that the great land areas between Near East and Middle East offer possibly the best aviation conditions in the world. There should, he considers, be a minimum of interference with regular running because of adverse weather. He is not prepared to say as much for the possible extensions at either end, But even if the Cairo-Karachi link is not necessarily a criterion for judging the possibility of longer runs, the inauguration of a service over it, the first instalment of the promised "by air to India" project, will be a notable event.