The New Zealand Times. MONDAY, OCTOBER 15, 1923. BRITISH AIR LINES

New Zealand Times, Volume L, Issue 11650, 15 October 1923, Page 6

The New Zealand Times. MONDAY, OCTOBER 15, 1923. BRITISH AIR LINES

It is good to know that the Imperial Government i& fully alive to the need for improving the communications of the Empire, so as to keep them thoroughly up to date and well abreast, if not in advance, of the latest modern developments in other countries. The keenness and vision of the British Government in regard to this matter is clearly evidenced by the manner in which it has taken up the great scheme, outlined by Commander Burney, R.N., for the establishment of a service of giant passenger-carrying airships on an All Red route, first to Egypt and India, and eventually to Australia and New Zealand. It is noteworthy that it is not to be a Government line of airships. But very generous subsidies are offered by the Government in order to make 6ure that commercial aerial lines to the distant parts of the Empire will be developed, and that in the not far distant future the air liners will be in actual operation. It is now made known that in order to further the scheme, a private company, the Imperial Airship Company, is being formed, with a. capital of £400,000, half of which will bo paid up; and the Imperial Government has definitely decided to grant this company an annual subsidy of £400,000 for a period of seven years. The Government will pay the first £400,000 unconditionally, to enable the company to make a start as far as India. When ships are actually flown from England to India in 100 hours with 100 passengers, the Government undertakes to grant the same annual subsidy for a period of three years; and, if the services are proved practicable by maintaining a weekly service for three months without a hitch, the subsidy will be granted for a further three years, making seven years in all. The company’s capital is being private-, ly subscribed, and no public appeal will be made until the service, lias proved a commercial success.

Six large airships are to be engaged | in the service to India, which is to be bi-weekly, and these air liners are to j be capable of carrying 150 to 200 pas- ! eengers, together with their luggage j and ten tons of mails. The fare for j passengers is to be between £7O and j £BO. A fortnightly air service be- 1 tween England and Australia is to be j established in the near future, accord- j ing to present plans. Six large airships are to be used in this service also. At first, however, they will not carry passengers, but mails only, for Australia and the Far East. Later, simillar services to Canada, South Africa, Hongkong, and Singapore will be established. The speed of the airships is to be eighty miles an hour, and they are to be capable of a nonstop flight at that speed of 12,0C0 miles; while at forty miles an hour*, without cargo, they will be able to make a non-stop flight of no less than 24,000 miles, or practically right round the globe, remaining in the air twentyfive days. In American aviation circles it is considered that if Commander Burney’s scheme proves successful, a regular airship service between London and New York is quite likely within a year’s time. The great airships are to be built at Bedford; and will be about double the size of any existing to-day. The works, it is interesting to note, are already erected for the job, so that evidently no time is to be lost in getting the scheme , under way. The first airship to be constructed will, it is stated, be of 4,000.000 cubic feet capacity, and havo an air-displacement of 150 tons; but later vessels will have a cubic capacity of 5,500,000 feet. These airships, it is estimated, will be able to take passengers to Bombay in five days, instead of the customary fifteen j by steamship; and another five days, j or six days at the outside, would land , them in New Zealand.

These figures show conclusively the great importance of the airship as a saver of time and an annihilator of distance. They at once make manifest the fact* that, now the airship has made it possible to cut down by twothirds the time required to travel from England to India, and by three-fourth 9 the time taken by a trip to Australia and New Zealand, it would be just as absurd and suicidal for the British Empire, with its far-flung dominions, to trust only to steamship communication, as it would hove been in the days of the speed supremacy of the steamship to trust to even the swiftest of sailing ships. The speediest possible methods of intercommunication are, obviously, absolutely essential in the case of the British Empire. Commercially, the saving in time that airships will bring about in the transport of business men, and of their correspondence and goods, is a factor the value of which in connection with the development and consolidation of our Empire cannot ho over-estimated; while, politically, the unrivalled facilities that these huge air-liners will afford for frequent conferences and lesa formal exchange of views between the statesmen representing the different parts of the Empire, cannot but have an even greater and more beneficial effect in that direction. These com eideratious are fully grasped by Commander Burney. Stating recently to a representative of the “Westminster Gazette” his reasons for devoting himself to the problem of airship communications, he pointed out that Britain supports only one-fourtli of her popu-

lation on home-grown food, and must, | therefore, concentrate upon the do- j volopment of the Empire, in order that Britain, together with her overseas dominions, may be a self-sup-porting economic unit. The first necessity for any economic and political unit, he declared, is adequately developed communications; and these, especially so far as air communications arc concerned, the Empire has hitherto lacked. This great need is now, however, in process of being met; and the resulting advantages to the Empire as a whole cannot be exaggerated.