AIR CRAFT IN FRANCE

Timaru Herald, Volume C, Issue 15309, 31 March 1914, Page 5

AIR CRAFT IN FRANCE

SAFETY THE CHIEF PROBLEM. • "1 WILL AIR TRAVEL BE FREE. H-ciiceforth (says a Paris writer) it will be ncce.ssary to ask at tho end of every year, what has been doing in the air, whiich man has so lately annexed to liis business world. Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Kenarrt, who was in at the beginning of dirigible ballooning, thinks tiiat 1913 has not made very satisfactory progress. "Safety in aeroplanes is tho chief technical problem to-day, just as it was a. year ago."

Til's is why all tho world is waiting to see how the new invention of Orvillo Wright_ is going to work. In France, the Union for Aeroplane Safety is now. n roar old, and has been offering money besides its great ••prize of 80,000dol.; but it has found nothing fco far to reward. There are half-a-dozen French inventions intended to remedy present insecurity or entirely, and several of these have made successful experiments. Pegoud's "looping the loop," which lias now become common, shows .tliat.the avaitor can I'sually Save himself a. fall if he is high enough up in tho air to have time to manoeuvre. But so far aeroplanes are practically only for •.military purposes.

Hero, too, France lias made little portress during the year, owing, it seems, to changes in the War Department. . War Minister Millerand and. Geneal Hirschauer, as permanent inspector of Mil.tary Aeronautics, in 1912 pushed France to tlie Very lirst rank in aeroplanes. Since politics put them out of office, Germany,has been catching up wonderfully, and even: England is far ■advanced. Something has been done in France in dirigible balloons, in which Germany has been ahead; but French results are only now beginning to appear.

France has a Targe air fleet—first, of aeroplanes, centred in half-a-dozen groups like so many flotillas, each with its ample yard for fabrication and experiment and training of pilots and officers; and. second, under advanced preparation, fleets of dirigible balloons, each also with its own yard and service quite separate from tlie aeroplanes. Germany has a, double fleet, ready for service, of aeroplanes and ball cons. Italy lias art aerplane fleet well advanc-' ed. England herself has more aero-

planes than is thought for her army; and - a French manufacturer Intely delivered to the English "War Office «u Astra-Torres dirigible balloon making a speed of fifty miles an hour net —wh.ch is tho record to date. Tho'..strategic sweep of reconnaissances from such a ivarship has been shown in French army manoeuvres on the "Fleurus,'' which returned from Gascogne in the southwest to the Belgian frontier. As Colonel I?onard remarks, this is not coasting, hut long distance navigation ; and star observations are being studied as a- guide •of movement when the air-vessel has to keep great heights. A,s to private performances in the air, material progress is being made constantly. From France, besides Pegoud's doings, the Alps and Pyrenees have been crossed and Garros has leaped the Mediterranean ; and now Pottrpe has been to Khartum and back, under Lord Kitchener's direction. There has been a Paris-Bordeaux race without touching tho .ground; and the distance from Paris to Warsaw has been covered in a single trip, Prevost has passed 125 miles anjioiir in speed; and Legagneux has mounted in the air higher than 3 7-10 miles.

Five years ago this month, Henry Farman received a French prize, for flying 1750 feet and back without touching the ground. Tli.s lie did at "a speed of less than forty miles an hour, and without going higher than sixty-five feet in the air. If we go hack fifteen years to Santos-Dumont flying round the Eiffel Tower in ,a dirigible balloon, we shall find like progress, though expense and cunihersomeness have rotated the progress of this branch of air navigation. What have wo not to expect from the. coming years? Enough to raise already the burning question—ls air travel to be free, or are the nations gointr to regulate the nassage of their frontiers? and how? Perhaps- man's conquest of the air will help to bring liberty and abolish the servitudes -which lead to war.