CONQUEST OF THE AIR—AND THE COST.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1885, 20 October 1913, Page 6

CONQUEST OF THE AIR—AND THE COST.

The account of the explosion of the German airship with the loss of twenty-eight lives is an impressivo reminder of the fact that tho campaign for tho conquest of the air is not being carried on without a very considerable sacrifice of men and money. Tho death-roll has been heavy, but the battle will go on until man becomes master of the air as he is of the land and sea. It took him a long whilo to conquer the sea, and no doubt many a pioneer in primitive seamanship found a watery grave in tho attempt. His first efforts probably were astride of a log with a paddle in his hand, and from this humble craft he advanced to tho skin 'canoe and tho dug-out. Tho invention of the ruddor and the sail worked wonders, and with their assistance man was able to leave the rivers and lakes and face the perils of the open pea. As in the conquest of the air rat the present timo many valuable lives are being lost, so thousands of our rude forefathers who ventured out into the deep never came back to tell the tale ox their adventures. ' With the passing of the ages the sailing ship was brought to great perfection, and before it was superseded by the iron steamer it had enabled seamen to circumnavigate the world; but thousands of years ago men must have made long sea voyages and built homes on almost every habitable island and continent. Our European voyagers, such as the Oabots, Columbus, Tasman, and Cook, deserve every credit for their deeds of daring on the ocean, but almost 'wherever they went they found that someone had been before them, and New Zealand was already occupied when the Maoris came to these shores. The only way in which modern explorers, could break new ground was by tho conquest of the Poles, and it was left to our own generation to witness this triumph of human skill and endurance. It was not done without the sacrifice of many brave men, but such lives were not wasted, for heroism and devotion to duty is one of the greatest moral assets which any nation can possess. Now practically tho whole world has been discovered and mapped. and steam navigation has changed the oceans from being barriers separating ono country from another into safe and convenient means of communication. So man, the earth's most restless tramp, has at last conquered both land and sea, and is now turning his attention to the air. It has taken the human race a long time to learn to fly, and even now it has only mastered the elementary • lessons of the art —something equivalent to the our forefathers had arrived at in' seamanship when, in tho long-forgotten past, the first sail was hoisted by some primitive navigator. The modern European is not the first of tho human race to attempt to _fly,_ for the ancient Chinese records indicate that more or less successful efforts in that direction were made over a thousand years ago. However, the fact' that flying was eventually abandoned as a means of locomotion goes to show that the Chinese did not really conquer the air. It would probably be more correct to say that the air conquered them. The ancient historian does not give us any idea as to the length of the deathroll of those pioneer airmen; but wo do know tnat the casualty list among the flying men of our own times is lamentably heavy. Still it is quite certain that, no matter how dearly experience is won, the modern attempt to bring the air into subjection to the will of man can never be given up. Wonderful progress has been made in a comparatively short period, but the timo when aircraft will become as safe and convenient for purposes of travel as steamers and motor-cars is yet in the uncertain future. It is tnie that airmen can fly long distances, turn somersaults, and per-' form other marvellous feats; but tho risks are great, and a satisfactory degree of stability and safety lias not yot been attained, A break-

down to a motor-car on terra firma is very seldom attended by fatal consequences. The occupants simply get out, and wait till the damago is repaired; but an accident such as that which has just caused the destruction of a German airship and twenty-eight lives is a very different matter. Passengers cannot get out of a flying machine' soaring over five hundred feet above the ground, and a fall from such a height means certain death. No doubt in the course o£ time human ingenuity will find means of guarding against almost every possibility of mishap, and tho risks will be very greatly reduced; but from the very nature of tho caso the navigation of tho air can nover, as far as one can at present judge, be as safe as travelling by land or sea. An air trip must always have a touch of adventure about it requiring cool nerves and great practical skill, and tho general reliability of aircraft will nave to be enormously increased before they become very serious competitors with railways and steamships for ordinary' passenger traffic. Yet it is impossible to view unmoved the very remarkable progress made during tho past two years in tho conquest of the air.