Planes May be Twice Present Size

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 19, 23 January 1937, Page 3

Planes May be Twice Present Size

WASHINGTON, Dec. 20. The Bureau of Air Commerce, estimating that 1,000,000 passengers have travelled America’s air lanes this year, said to-day ’planes twice as large as any now in uso may be flying commercial routes in two years. A bureau ofti cial said one manufacturing company is constructing a 40-passeuger 20-ton ship. The largest ’planes now flying scheduled routes carry a maximum oi 21 passengers. Flying as a commercial enterprise over established routes is only about 10 years old. In 1926, regular traus port ’planes carried 5000 passengers. Last year the number was 800,000. The bureau official said demands of air travel are so great that the 40-passenger four-motor ’plane would be economically sound if it could be put into operation immediately. Principal expansion of facilities so far, he said, has been in the direction of more ’planes and routes rather than in the size of iudi- 1 vidual ships. The plan to finance construction of this ’plane, he said, indicated that commercial flying may get away from rapidly changing styles in transport ’planes and turn instead to use of the same general types on all trunk lii»2s. In the case of the new air leviathan, five operating companies pooled £20,000 each for construction and tests of the first ’plane. “This may mean that ultimately the field of transport ’plane manufacturing will be narrowed to one or two principal companies,” the official said.