"NERVES" IN THE AIR

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 181, 20 April 1918, Page 7

"NERVES" IN THE AIR

FLUNG MEN WHO GO STALE. . The nerve strain of flying is enormous, but people who are "full out" and really i'ond of going up aro not constantly aware of it—fortunately. So long as a man "does not notice" that lie is flying and feels quite at. bomo in the air his nerves are all right. As soon as ho begins to think too much about it, they are wrong. Very few people can go on flying constantly year after year. That gift belongs to rare exceptions—to men like Hawker and WingCoinmnnder Samson, for example, who can still go up day by day with tho same zest as-they did before the war. . Sooner or later the majority of fliers go "mouldy." There is one man, famous as one of the earliest seaplane experts, who seldom goes up nowadays, and when he does he is almost afraid to "bank." There is another, celebrated two years ago as ono of the star "boy pilots," who has never had a bad-crash,.-nut who has '''gone stale," and l now , does with tlie greatest caution. the "stunts" which formerly he performed with tho most brilliant dash and daringr A thirdwho once would fly 'across the Nortli Sea with equanimity is now unable to 6leep if ho foresees the chance of such, a journey on the morrow.

The- biggest trouble of all is that five times out of six-a pilot who is temporarily excused flying does,not get back his old form. To bo an expert in the air you must fly regularly, just as to excel at billiards you must play that game regularly; and though a man who has been "oft" with "cold feet" for a timo may go back and still be quite a useful flier, he is seldom his old self in the air. He. thinks too much—aud that is more or less fatal.