COMING STATIONS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 258, 1 November 1932, Page 10

COMING STATIONS

FUTURE OF FLYING OWNER-PILOT’S ADVENT LANDING PROBLEMS. There is, I believe, a close affinity between the problems of motoring and flying —perhaps I would say between those of road and air motoring. The possibilities of both were realised a great many years ago, and both had to await the coming of the petrol engine before any substantial progress could be made, writes the Earl of Cardigan in the Daily Mail. The early drivers, like the early pilots, wore regarded either as criminals or imbeciles. In both cases public opinion gradually changed; and the new machines were accepted—with certain reservations. With a chauffeur at the wheel, with a professional pilot in the cockpit, with an expert mechanic hovering in the background—it was under these conditions that a place was found for them in the scheme of things. Then, in the case of motoring, came a tremendous change, marked by the advent of the owner-driver. It is not too much to say that the motor-car has been revolutionised since this individual made his appearance on a large 'scale some ten years ago. A Practical Person. Are we, I wonder, on the verge of just such a revolution in regard to flying? The owner-pilot, a new and still a rare species, is appearing here and there, and we are beginning to receive him less as an enterprising lunatic and more as a practilal, normal person. And why not? Of what crime is the aeroplane guilty, apart from its relative youthfulness, that we should look at it askance? Is it dangerous? Certainly not. The vast majority of civilian flying accidents are due, not to any failure on the part of the machine, but to some failure of the human element. Sometimes—not often—it is a failure of skill; far more commonly it is a failure of ordinary prudence.

Given a skilful and prudent pilot, I seriously regard the aeroplane as a safer vehicle than most. It has the immense advantage of being an entirely indepedent unit. It is never at the mercy of “the fool around the corner.” It has complete freedom of manoeuvre. A sudden emergency is rarely met with. Even a forced landing, the beginner’s bugbear, occupies a period of roughly three minutes under normal circumstances, so that to be taken by surprise is a very unusual happening indeed. Is it unreliable? Far from it. In the first place, an aeroplane, being an essentially simple piece of mechanism, has very few components which are liable to failure. Secondly, the amount of care taken to see that nothing ever docs go wrong would astonish the owner of any other vehicle. If any Dart of the machine—as, for instance, the magneto—is at all susceptible to trouble, it is duplicated. Is it difficult to manage? I think not. The art of flying has, of course, a technique of its own, but this can be readily mastered by anyone possessing good “hands” and an accurate judgment. The purely mechanical mind, curiously enough, is sometimes at a disadvantage—for mathematical precision cannot be brought to bear upon a fluid element—and thus the average woman may easily prove a more apt pupil than, lot us say, the racing motorist.

Easier Than a Car. Once in the air, the pilot actually has a very mu'ch easier job than the ordinary motorist. When driving over crowded roads, I find that I have to exert a fairly high degree of intelligence more or less continuously if I am to keep up a reasonable average speed without getting into trouble. In the air, apart from the problems of navigation, I have to exercise intelligence only twice in each flight—when taking off and when landing again. A largo proportion of each journey is spent in leaning back and enjoying myself.

What, then, are the problems that confront the owner-pilot? How is it that the species does not increase more rapidly? Apart from the obvious question of expense, the chief reason, as I see it, is that the aeroplane, so efficient and reliable in its own element, is by no means handy in relation to the earth from which it must start and to which it must return. It demands a very considerable amount of space both for taking-off and landing purposes. so that it tan only operate between fields of more than ordinary size. This, of course, is a great nuisance., since large fields are not always available where and when they are needed, and we may reasonably sic what the owner-pilot is going to do about it. Landing Speeds. So far, he has contented himself with stressing the need for more aerodromes up and down the country. I nm aware that I am in the minority, but I believe this to be a hopelessly wrongheaded solution of the basic problem with which civil aviation is confronted. The crying need, as I see it, is not to make our fields safe and suitable for aircraft, but to make our aircraft safe* and suitable for fields. The fields are there. There is one, for instance, opposite to my front door, and I have the owner’s permission to make use of it. It is a good-sized field, but I, as an amateur, could not get into it unless the wind happened to be blowing the right way. If 1 got into it, the wind might •change, and 1 could not get out again.

In my view, the owner-pilot ought, to agitate for lower landing speeds. It would not make much difference to him if some of his top speed were sacrificed. The difference between SO and 90 m.p.h. in the air is not perceptible except by studying the clock. The difference between landing in my field and going to the aerodrome «ix miles away is obvious and annoying. If the history of motoring is any guide, the really big advance in civil aviation will not. come until the. voice of (ho owner-pilot is heard in tho land. Not merely the voiVe of the speedmerchant—still less the voice of tho stunt-merchant—but tho voice of the practical man asking for a strictly practical machine.

A boring follow, no doubt, this practical nian-in-the-street; but he sometimes plays a very useful part, It was he, and no other, who gave us the £lOO motor-car. It is ho, and no other, who will bring the aeroplane within tho reach of the owner-pilots of the future.