AIR SICKNESS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXIX, Issue 107, 27 June 1911, Page 6

AIR SICKNESS.

An instructive report by Dr. .Reno Ci ucJiet, Professor at the University of Bordeaux, on the physical symptoms felt by , airmen a lien Hying at various altitudes and when making rapid ascents and descents, was read at the Academy of Science, Paris, a few weeks ago. The doctor is convinced that air sickness, as experienced by aviators, is quite dilfercnt from ordinary mountain sickness, lb is well known, the doctor explained, that mountain climbers experience a certain sickness when reaching an elevation of GOOD feet. Aviators are affected in a similar way, hub much sooner when they have reached heights of, say, only .‘IOOO feet to 4000 feet. The respiration is shortened,, the pulse beats quicker, and headaches follow. A general feeling of sickness .is the. result, and the stomach io sometimes upset. The dangers of high . Hying, therefore, are, immensely, increased, as the aviator has not only to. manage the equilibrium of his machine and watch the motor, but has also to battle against physiological difficulties which are nlmnsf insinpiountkhlq. The air sicknessreaches ' its maximum, not when rising, but; vyiieh descending. This, pity's Dr. Cruchei, , ( may partly he accounted for by the |g'pt,. that the aviator i l , usually in live «or ten miputes from heights to which ho took forty to fifty minutes to mount. The physiological discolors, tend to increaselie nears the, ground. The heart heats faster thaq, gyer, the palpitation becomes ‘audible, the breathing is irregular, 'the buzzing in the cars becomes violent. n .. Other, strange plicmdrriena " are' * o'oser'f ell!”' Aviators feel their faces burning ; they look red and bloodshot in',the eyes, the headache is more violent than in, the ascent, .‘ail'd, 1 " what is ifbtse 1 ,'than all, the eyes close automatically and the feeling of wanting to go to sloop is invincible, 0 * They* 1 shut'; their eyes in spite 'of 11 ‘every effort ltd, keep them open, and sometimes dose away for short intervals. Something of this kind. explains Dr. Crnchbt, must have happened 1 to tiio late MG jPhavcz when he cafnd’down after crossing the Alps in September his't.