CENTENARY AIR RACE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 77, Issue 154, 2 July 1934, Page 7

CENTENARY AIR RACE

COMPETITORS’ RISKS LLOYD’S WILL NOT QUOTE LONDON ,Junc 29. The Daily Express says that Lloyd’s underwriters refuse to insure lives and aeroplanes in the Centenary Air Race, holding that there is no precedent for a race of this description. Sir Charles Kingsford Smith tried tc buy' a life policy of between £15,000 and £20,000, also one on the machine for £6OOO, but less than £5OO was offered him. MR. FOKKER’S PREDICTIONS. GREAT SPEEDS EXPECTED. LONDON, June 12. Tho Centenary air race probably will be won by continuous day and night flying, and the distance covered in 60 or even 50 hours, Air. Fokker, the Dutch air expert, predicted to-day. Air. Looker thinks the Dutch entries have a very good chance of winning the speed event, but something depends in the handicap event on the terms regarding passengers, eight of whom have been provisionally booked in Fokker 36. This machine has four engines, aiu’ will have a crew of five or six. It will bo piloted by Ivan Smirnoff, Holland’s premier pilot, a man of Russian descent, who, with Moll, made tha record flight to the East Indies from Amsterdam in four days four hours four minutes. Mr. Fokker said that long-distance flying was nothing unusual, the only new thing being that a cruising speed of 200 miles an hour was likely to be normal in the near future, and could be made to pay. Within two years 25C miles an hour would probably be the ordinary passenger speed. Tn the speed section of the air race, competitors must land at five control points to check in. The winner in the speed section will receive the whole of the £lO,OOO prize.