AVIATION.

Hokitika Guardian, 19 November 1927, Page 3

AVIATION.

FLIGHT TO INDIA. ANXIETY FOR THEIR SAFETY. (Australian & N.Z. Cable Association.) LONDON, Nov. 18. Anxiety is growing over the absence of news of Hinkler and -Mclntosh, who have been gone sixty hours at midnight. The fuel would have been exhausted in forty hours. The pioneer route covers very lonely stretches, and in the event of a forced landing it would he days before a message could reach England. The airmen carried only sufficient rations for the flight. It is considered that if they kept their course, they would certainly have been., observed at some point. Hinkler’s navigation is so skilful that tin possibility of his losing his direction is ruled out by experts. Russian authorities are searching the territory over which it is presumed the plane crossed early this morning, if Hinkler kept the correct coui-.se, the route would he over the Sind Desert, where a descent would he dangerous. R.A.F. machines are searching.

GIANT FLYING BOAT. LONDON, Nov. IS

The largest all-metal flying boat in the world, in which Cobharn is to make a twenty-thousand miles circuit of Africa, took off in the Medway. C’obham said the object was to gain data of the Cape to Cairo airway, and the possibility of operating giant flying boats from the Cape to England. If the route was operated regularly, one of the loads already promised was a ton of gold daily. TVING SLOTS INVENTION. LONDON, Nov. 17. Sir Samuel Hoare to-day is flying experimentally as a passenger in a machine fitted with automatic safety wing slots, the invention of Handley Page, the American rights of which have been sold to the United States Government for £220,000. The slots are designed to give the pilot lateral control when flying slowly, and when in such a. position as would ordinarily mean stalling and a fatal spin, to which is attributed approximately ninety per cent of all aeroplane accidents.

EMPIRE AIR. ROUTES. LONDON, Nov. IS. Sir R. Horne in answer to questions relating to the proposed air route to Australia and Capetown, stated that the service to Cairo and to Asia was operating Weekly each way, with a hundred per cent efficiency. For the next stage to Karachi, Persia had not yet agreed to the route along the shores of the Persian Gulf. The Government of India was organising a route from Karachi to Calcutta. The Royal Air Force nad already surveyed the link from Calcutta to Rangoon, and Singapore. With reference to the South African route, an experimental service from Khartoum to Kisuniu was interrupted owing to ft mishap to a machine. NO NEWS OF HINCKLER. 'Roceived this day at 8 a.m.) LONDON, Nov. 18. There is still no news of Ilinckler. GILES POSTPONES FURTHER. SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 18. Giles has again postponed his departure. He announced he would not attempt to hop off to-day after Smith s monoplane, Southern Cross, had made two test trials on behalf of Giles to observe atmospheric conditions, and had reported these unfavourable.