ON THE AIR HIGHWAYS

Hokitika Guardian, 14 May 1920, Page 4

ON THE AIR HIGHWAYS

(i>y merry Harper iechuicai Secretary ; of the Civil Aerial Transport Committee.) ■ ■Aeroplane pilots, moving swiftiy at an altitude where climatic changes actually begin to take place—where ,veathef is, so to say, manufactured —encounter sometimes a bewildering succession of conditions even during the Bourse of a few minutes. -v - it is no uncommon thing for an aeroplane to come gliding down to an airport such as Hounslow with its planes and hull drenched by a rain vhicll* lias been experienced only in the upper air. On the ground, that is-to say, the weather remains perfectly line aud dry, the rain-storm encountered by the airmail at some great height having evaporated before it has had time to reach the earth.

. It is strange, too, those of us cm tho ground, where there is perhaps scarcely a breath of wind, to hear the pilot of 'the air express, after lie has alighted, talk of a fierce fight lie has had, all the way from Paris to London against d boisterous gale which has so buffeted liis machine that he has had all his work cut out to keep it on the course. This gale has been one which, raging fiercely in the upper altitudes, lias passed away before it extended to ground level. Only the other day, when tlie wind was of no more than average strength on the ground, a hurricane of tlie great velocity of 180 miles an hour was rushing through space at a height of 5 or 6 miles. Incidentally it may he mentioned that it was lucky for us this tremendous wind did not descend to earth level. If it had it would have swept away buildings like chaff. Pilots of the aerial mail, soaring in lonely state thousands of feet above the dhrth sometimes see cloud effects which are almost indescribable-in their grandeur, But perhaps one of the strangest experiences of all is when on airman imagines he is m the centre of a huge circular hole in the air; which by the way, and as a further puzzlement, seems as though it is moving along with him, just at the same pace as his machine. The aeroplane, that is to say, though it may be traveling at 100 miles an hour, appears to remain constantly in the centre of the circular space, with a ring of opaque mist at exactly the same distance away from it on all sides. ■

The explanation is quite simple. The -weather is so misty that the pilot cannot see more than about, say, nilf a mile in any direction. Beyond this his dye is unable to penetrate. Hence seeing thus far and n® farther in all directions in which he may glance, he has the quite perfect impression of being on the centre of a big circular cavity, the boundaries, of which, at any point are represented exactly iby the limits of his own vision.

The suggestion that this gap or cavity, is moving along with him is gained from the fact that precisely the -ame conditions of visibility continue from minute to minute. Though it is true that his machine is in swift motion, the pilot still continues to see nothing at any point save the wall of mist which encircles him; and this fact, and the absence of any definite stationary object which, as he was passing it, would indicate his speed, preserves very convincingly from minute to minute, this illusion of his machine being always at the central point of some inexplicable “hole in the air.” There is little wonder that the men who navigate these great and silent highways of the air should return to earth sometimes with a rather dazed and strangely thoughtful look.