AIR FORCE CRUISE.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20275, 9 April 1934, Page 1

AIR FORCE CRUISE.

British Planes to Visit U.S. Territory. British Official Wireless. RUGBY, April 6. A flving-boat squadron which left Singapore early this week is engaged on a cruise which will last alxmt five weeks, and will include halts of a week in Manila, in the Philippines, and of ten days in Hong Kong. This will lie the first time that a Royal Air Force sqvadron has visited United States’ territory. The flight is being made by members of No. 205 Squadron, which has made many long distance formation flights. In 1927-28 it made a cruise of 28,000 miles, and in 1932 had another cruise of 20,000 miles, to its credit. It is equipped with Southampton twinengined flying boats, which have proved of great value in flights, where there are no natural landing grounds and the preparation of aerodromes is costly and difficult. On the way to the Philippines, where three calls will be made, the flyingboats will alight at Sibu, in Borneo, and, after a visit to Hong Kong, they will make their way to the Federated Malay States by way of the Portugese possession of Macao, and three ports in • French Indo-China. The last call before returning to the base at Singapore will be Koda Bahruein, in the Federated Malay States. The longest section of the trip will be between the Philippines and Hong Kong, a distance of 500 miles over the open sea.