FORGED LADINGS.

Hokitika Guardian, 9 August 1917, Page 4

FORGED LADINGS.

(By a British Airman.)

I sat in a colossal machine with a small engine, know'll as a “ Hong Horn.”

The pilot sat in front of me, giv-ing-instructions. it was.-my first flight, A cry of “ Switchoff, suck in,” which means that a ’ machine is to turn the propeller . and get the engine-cylinders full. Then “contact,” and presently with a whirr, the engine is running. Then away, bump, bump, bump over the ground, and a smooth slipping off into space, and the earth suddenly far below, and treetops disappearing beneath the planes. The signal came to put my hands on the controls and feel the pilot’s movements. They were incomprehensible, busy all the time, while the machine rocked and swayed in the air.

It was a “ bumpy ” day. ;Sharp gusts of wind, striking trees and hedges and buildings and folds in the ground, would shoot upwards like ocean breakers against the sea. wall. These could be felt at 2,000 ft, and would throw' one up and down 50ft and more at a time. . . < Not a very good day for a first flight, but pilots were in demand and time precious. Then suddenly the rhtlimic roar of. the engine was broken. Crash, bang, bang, bang, bang, and it stopped. The pilot’s arms wmggled furiously and I let go. He did a a sharp “ bank” into the wiivd and we grazed over the tree-tops and down into a field among horses. A smashed rod in the engine and forced landing from I,oooft —not an easy job in a clumsy machine in wooded country on a bumpy day I I hopped out. “My word,” I said, “ this is interesting ! ”

That was all I. felt. . . and I worked like a slave all day on the repairs. i:- * « * *' *

A. .litlie later I was in a much more delicate type of machine—a real (lying machine, not a “ bus.” The occasion was “ first flight alone under higher instruction.” Flying was still an “interesting” game ; its terrors were still unknown. -

Again I experienced that sudden silence from the engine —and only trees below. Tree,®, trees everywhere, and one little patch of green, and the machine gliding lower every second at 00 miles an hour. Suppose ope hit a tree. . . .

I passed too high over those trees to hit the patch of green .where there there was room to run. The opposite hedge loomed up, just where I ought to meet the ground. I charged right at it, and at the last moment “scummed” up and hopped it, and flopped down on the other side. Strange to say only a shock-absorber was broken.

In another flight long after CQjne the same sudden, sickening cessation of engine. The wind was blowing strongly from the west, blojving one away from “ home ” country. On that occasion I was high over the Hun lines, 15,000 ft or more., sitting over a town while “Archie” burst furiously aronnd —you can never get out of range of “ Archie.” The same long glide down, but the wind was so strong against me that the machine simply hovered. We were settling down, the machine and 1, on to that town, with “ Archie ” getting nearer and nearer. I watched the height-meter hand recede. 1 I watched a certain crossroads in front of my right vying; it seemed to remain just the same dis tance ahead. At less than I.oooft, with machine gun and rifle bullets whistling past me, dodging frantically left ana right with what remained of my height,' J realised the machine, was going forward. At the lower altitude the speed of the win 3 was less and progress possible. I “sat down” at length on the ground a little behind opr lines with Hun shells bursting all about rpeThen, a scramble for cpver and the collapse of utter exhaustion.