AIR TRAVEL

Hokitika Guardian, 5 October 1918, Page 4

AIR TRAVEL

' AN ALLURING FORECAST j 1 London, August 13 j j There were some interesting speeches at a luncheon at the Automobile Club the other day, at which Mr Handley Page, the designer of the famous bombing aeroplane ; which bears his name, made a few suggestions as to the likely development of commercial aviation. Mr Handley Page said before the war mails took seventy-two hours between London and Constantinople ; now the journey can be done under twenty hours. Rome can he e reached in twelve and a half hours instead of forty-two, and Marseilles in eight instead of twenty-three. He was convinced tliat an eight hundred mile service could be run at a profit, both for mails and passengers at a rate little in excess of that now in force, a medium-sized machine being used to make nonstop flights of four hundred miles. They would have 300 h.p. engines, and would carry. 4400’1b of revenueearning load besides the pilot and, mechanic and 'petrol. A 600 h.p. ; machine could carry comfortably six passengers, totalling 9001 b, and 1 35001b0f postal matter and merchan--1 dise, and the passengers could be 7 carried at is peril) per .800 miles, l or 2]d per mile. On that basis the ’* charge for letters would be less than id an ounce, and that would include r the handling of mails. America e would become within reach in a day 1 and a half, and would be as close as y Manchester was at the end of the 1 18th Century. Twenty-four machines running a minimum service a of six machines each way per day ’’ could be provided for at a capital k of mider £500,000, and at an annual cost of under ,£600,000. The cost *• per ton mile would be 20M and for e passenger mile rsfid. ? Sir Joseph Ward was asked to make a speech. He said the de- * velopment of flying during the past . two years had been phenomenal. 1 On a former visit he had declared that the air and under sea regions e would play the greatest part in the ' s war, and that the expenditure then being incurred was infinitesimal j! compared with what would be rc- , quired ;in fact, that aeroplanes and [ anti-submarine vessels would cost , more than the whole of the British ' Navy. That view was looked upon ? as extraordinary optimism, but what was the position to-day ? g Aeroplanesauddestroyersfor checking submarines were going to have - ! much greater say in the war than j was contemplated long after the war j had started, and he though: that a even yet a great improvement in r ! flying machines would still be made e | which would result in bringing them r | into practical use for commercial purposes. That would certainly be “! sofor the carrying of mails after s ! the war V j Before leaving New Zealand, when c j opening the post office at Herej j taunga, lie indicated that the Postal | Department would carry its mails e ! to various points through the air as ' . soon as the war was over. He was a 1 now more firm than ever in that s j conviction. He had no doubt that very shortly the masters of the air would be travelling from England I to America with comparative safety. That distance was more than 3,000 ’’ miles. It could readily be undere stood-by those familiar with the ' j geographical conditions of New i i Zealand that it would be a comparaj lively easy matter to carry mails between the principal centres, dropping bags at towns by the way ’ —a thing that a few years ago would have beeu considered impossible. He had already seen machines in j England that could carry three or 1 four tons of mails and take them over the distance from Auckland to Wellington in four hours, ‘ from Wellington to Christchurch in 1 less than two hours, and to Dunedin 1 and Invercargill in proportion. He | was satisfied it was well within the possibilities of the Department to carry mails by aeroplanes, and he • doubted very much whether the cost > in the long run would be any greater ' than was being paid for similar services now. At all events, the whole : matter would begone into with -a j view to New Zealand being up-to- ; date, as it lias been in all its public j utility services. He had obtained 1 full information from General Sykes, the. head of the British Aviation Department, that this would be fully gone into and considered on his return to New Zealand. Tll conclusion Sir Joseph remarked that when once it is demonstrated that the distance between England and America could safely be covered by aeroplane it became quite practicable to make the journey out to New Zealand. There ! would, of course, be special touching points between British Columbia and New Zealand, possibly Hawaii and Fiji, which would make the spans not nearly so long as the Atlantic. The question of an aerial navigation, would, perhaps, be more difficult where they had to pick up small islands instead of a large continent, but he had no doubt that scientific men would make the necessary provision for doing this with certainty.