THE SAFETY AEROPLANE PARACHUTE

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 286, 29 August 1919, Page 3

THE SAFETY AEROPLANE PARACHUTE

EEffABD OF TEARS OF PATIENT STUDY. Airmen everywhere will congratulate Itr. Everaifd R. Calthrop, M.1.C.E., M.l.Mech.E., who. r.fter years' of patient study and experiment, has at last produced a life-saving parachute accentable by the Air Ministry for all service" aeroplanes (says the "Daily slii.il"). Mr. Everard Ciilthrop comes of a family rich in engineering genius. At the outbreak of war he submitted to the Government plans of a destructive weapon, which were at once rejected as being "too terriblo for consideration." It is an open secret now that had tho Hun pone one step farther, Mr. Calthrop's invention would liavo been siven a trial. Mr. Calthrop dates .his association with parachutes as far back as 1910, when, as a friend of the late Mr. Charles Rolls, he souplit some means of escape for airmen, He lmd witnessed a bad balloon accident in Bombay, !>,nd studied air currents in the Himalayas and Sierra Madre Mountains, Mexico, ns well as hnying experienced a typhoon in the Arabian Sea. The idea was to make an automatically and instantaneously opening parachute. At this problem Mr. Culthrop worked night and day, sleeping for weeks at his workshop in the Edgware Road and "spending more mnnev in experiments tt\nn he cavos to think about." The problem was first solved by drawing the narachute as it left its cose over ft rigid "launching plate" in such a manner that from the moment t'uo airman's weight was thrown upon it the parachute enclosed a column of nir. Nothins; could stop its openinsr then, and lia called it Hie "Guardian Ansel." But tho Government wanted a le=s complicated device which did not require to be carried in a metal case or need the service,? of an expert to ropack. The "Guardinn Angel,"' with blackened fillincs, however was used for dropping spies from TTandlpv Pago ni.'htIjombine machines far behind'the'enemy s hues, with, such success that at the armistice an attempt was made somewhat rpluetantl.v, to fit parachutes to a lew nglitins aeroplanes. •if» n came a ra l"est from the "Daily Mail for a parachute for dropping heavy loads of newspapers carried in a confined space in the under-nart of the aeroplane body. It was while working on this problem that Mr. Calthrop hit upon a flexible casing for tho parachute wlncli liad all the advantages of positive opening hitherto dependent on the laiiiiching-jilnfp" and none of its disadvantages. After a> thorough testing by the Aiv Ministry, tho parachute was adopted' for all sorvico aeroplanes.

, It is Plated that the nir mail service in America will bo extended from Chicajro to Otiiwlui and St. Louis, shortening tho time for ecrrospoiulonce between tho Atlantic! and Pacific coasts by from 12 to U hours.