AVIATION AND LIQUOR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20767, 9 January 1931, Page 14

AVIATION AND LIQUOR.

PILOTS AND PASSENGERS

" OCCASIONALLY ADVISABLE."

[FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.] LONDON, Nov. 25.

Major K. M. Beaumont, representing Imperial Airways, giving evidence before the Licensing Commission, maintained that stimulants were a necessity for many air passengers, and it was occasionally advisable for pilots to take them.

" Experience has shown," said Major Beaumont, " that passengers require intoxicating liquors at times, not only in connection with meals which are taken in the air, but also to . counteract and mitigate the effects of air-sickness." He proposed that aircraft should have liberty to supply passengers with liquor during the flight, and also before they started and after they arrived at their destination. It was suggested ttiat special arrangements should be mado to enable liquor to be supplied at the buffet at Croydon to any passenger who produces an air ticket for an outgoing or an incoming service. In reply to Sir John Perkier, a member of the commission, Major Beaumont said I hat it would be unwise to forbid a pilot to take any alcohol while in the air. Occasionally the intense cold at high altitudes made it. advisnblo that a pilot should be able to take a stimulant. Sir John: Would you send up a pilot perfectly free to lake a drink if he wanted it at any time during Ins flight * Maj or Beaumont: I think thai would be a wise thing. A pilot may go up fairly lull of liquor and suffer, as some people do when they leave public-houses, from the effects of the cold?—I should not like to visualise such a tiling. Major B< •aumonl explained that the pilots wen selected only after some 5000 hours' Hying experience under the most exacting circumstances, and actually (lie. ma|oril,v were teetotallers. Sir John: Your point \s that the selection of the pilots would really guarantee sufficient sobriety Major Beaumonl said that was his point. Ho was authorised to say that the Air Ministry did not object to any of his points, and because of the somewhat anomalous position of the Ait Ministei, Lord Amulree, who was also the chairman of the commission, the Ministry had lett the whole matter in his hands.