AIR SERVICES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3898, 27 November 1928, Page 67

AIR SERVICES.

SOUTHERN CROSS FLYERS. / .GREAT SCHEME READY. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, November 15. There seems to be a great deal of satisfaction in the knowledge that Australia is not to lose the services of Squadron-Leader Kingsford-Smith and Flight-Lieutenant Ulin, the heroes of the Southern Cross. Although they have planned to go abroad, they have refused tempting offers that have been made by American organisations, and by this time next year they hope to be operating aerial mail and passenger services between Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, and in addition, to be manufacturing aircraft for defence and civil purposes. Smith and Ulin are now in the process of forming the companies which will carry out the ambitious programme that has been laid down. The ultimate extension of the company’s operations to New Zealand is a possibility, once the Australian business has been firmly established.

Ulm has explained that although the three cities will be connected by the proposed services, calls will be made at many of the towns en route, the timetable providing for six or eight stops. Triple-engined machines of from 8 to 14 passenger capacity are contemplated, and they will be of British manufacture. One of the types under consideration is practically identical with the Southern Cross, only with a smaller wing span, and another type under consideration is the well-known de Havilland Hercules, a type that is at present used by Imperial Airways, and which has been ordered for the new Western Australian service between Perth and Adelaide. The Postal Department will shortly call for tenders for an aerial mail service between Sydney and Brisbane, and the new company will endeavour to secure the contract.

Provision is to be made for equipping all aerodromes that will be used in the service for night flying (revolving beacons, flood lights, boundary lights, etc.) and the aviators are pleased to be able to announce that an Australian company is prepared to carry out the whole of the complicated and extensive lighting system. Of the financial success of the new company Smith and Ulm are firmly convinced and they point ;o the success in a limited field of Westralian Airways, Ltd., which operates over a sparcely populated route. The Queensland company, which encounters similar conditions, has also made a financial success of its operations. Smith and Ulm propose a service of two and a-half trips a week, and point out that they will serve a population of at least 3,000,000 people. Present indications are that the Melbourne to Sydney fare would be about £6 to £8 a passenger and the Sydney to Brisbane fare about £7 to £9 a” passenger. The passengers will be accommodated in comfortable, enclosed cabins, the temperature of which can easily be regulated. Naturally the whole route will 'be thoroughly organised, and test flights will be made before a definite time-table is announced. The negotiations, however, have advanced so far that Ulm has been able to publish a proposed time-table and schedule of fares. Kingsford-Smith proposes to personally instruct all the pilots engaged, and give them special instruction on the handling of large triple-engined machines, in the use of modern flying and navigation instruments, and in night flying. Should the present plans mature they believe that the new service will be in operation in November of next year. After the service has been set in operation the question of extending it to Tasmania will be considered, and later on to New Guinea.

Referring to the proposal to manufacture planes Ulm said: “We are confident that Australia can produce the skilled tradesmen necessary for successfully manufacturing modern aircraft, and while it cannot be expected that we in Australia, so far removed from the world centres of the aircraft industry, can compete in the matter of modern design, we feel that by linking up with one of the more up to date designing and manufacturing companies, and keeping in close contact with them, we can in time produce the whole of the aircraft necessary for the development of civil aviation, and also a large proportion of the aircraft required by our air forces. Moreover, we believe that aircraft production can be carried on in Australia in such a manner as to compare favourably with British manufacture on questions of cost and workmanship. We hope—and apart from hoping will conscientiously .work—for the time when Australia will produce within her own boundaries sufficient aircraft to meet its own needs and the needs of her sister Dominion, New Zealand.”