THE COST AND REWARD

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 73, Issue 428, 20 November 1930, Page 9

THE COST AND REWARD

There is a general impression that fliers who make epochal flights to Australia from England receive an enormous sum of money directly or indirectly for their flights. This is not the case, however. In this regard Amy Johnson’s flight was an exception. From the Vacuum Oil Company it is learned that these flights do not cost a great deal so far as petrol and oil arc concerned It is cheaper than travelling in the best accommodation that first-class steamers have to offer. Motor spirit to the value <>f £9O and oil to the value of £lB—a total of £lO8 —were used by Oscar Gar den on his flight from England to Australia. It is not in the air that the expenses of a world-wide flight are incurred. The laying down of supplies, the arrangements for a very tjrcd man on his alighting after, say, 10 hours at the joy stick, the maintenance of inc chanics at each place of call, the arrangements for food and accommodation, the supplying of sandwiches ami refreshments for the flight—these and a hundred other details, are expensive. Supplies of motor spirit and oil had to be ready for Garden not only at th? proposed landing places, but at all places where it might have been necessary to make emergency landings. At the various stopping places reports of weather conditions were furnished to Oscar Garden, and these furnished him with full knowledge of the flying conditions he had to encounter over various stages of his journey.