DEADLY WEAPONS FROM THE AIR.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 187, 30 June 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

DEADLY WEAPONS FROM THE AIR.

GERMAN THREAT THAT THHY HAVE "SOMETHING WORSE."

NEW TORPEDOES.

TO BE FIRED FROM AEROPLANES AT SEVERAL MILES' RANGE.

(By Eric Stuart Bruce, M.A. F.R Met. Soc.

A member of the crew captured t rom Llo states that something worse than airship bombs is in store for Britain. Simultaneously reports came from Switzerland that the Germans are paying great attention to the development of long-range aerial torpedoes at their factory near Lake Constance. It is also declared that the enemy will be able to launch the new torpedoes from aeroplanes as well as from airships. Mr. Bruce, who in this article discusses the development of aerial torpedoes, is a well-known student of aerial warfare.

Aerial means of warfare are making such strides that it is not safe to rule out any particular plan merely because it seems too wildly imaginative. The kind of war in the air with which British people ar.e most familiar is the dropping of bombs from airships. But now the aerial torpedo, which may be launched in a similar manner to the submarine torpedo at an object from several milts' range, is n.eognised as a practical instrument. Not only is it possible to discharge torpedoes from airships, but akso irom aeroplanes, providing the latter are cf sufficient size and stability. It is also within the bounds of possibility, as I shall indicate later in this article, that aerial torpedoes, controlled by electric waves, may be launched against airships. The torpedo discharged from aircraft is a development of the aerial torpedo used in land fighting on loth sides, which was first introduced in warfa.-e during the present conflict. Ihe Germans profited by the brains of other nations. They got the aerial torpedo from a Swede, as they got uie Fokkcr 'plane from a Dutchman. THE TORPEDO'S DEVELOPMENT. The aerial torpedo came into the hands of the Germans in Ifoß. The inventor was Lieut.-Colonel Unge—l» Swede. In 1909 a hundred of his aerial torpedoes, with their special launching tubes, were made at Stockholm and sent to Messrs Krupp, of Essen, tor cxnerimental work. Doubtless it is a modification of the original design of Lieut-Colonel Unge that is being used by the Germons at the present time on their Zeppelins. The modern tjpe of aerial torpedoes now in use by Germany arc cylindrical in shape, and their front ends are pointed. The bore is 13 centimetres. They consist of thro.? distinct parts. la front is the shell with the percussion cap at its point, «nd charged with a powerful explosive (prooably trinitrotoluol). Next comes a cylinder, containing igniting powder, forming by combustion a large amount f gas and smoke, but no flame. Behind there is a little turbine of the same diameter as the rest of the projectile. The launching tube is placed in one of the cars of the Zeppelins, and mounted on a support with a universal joint, so that it can be pointed in any direction. CLAIMS OF THE FRENCH. To launch the torpedo, the igniting powder is fired by electricity. The gas produced by the ignition of the powd?r escapes at the back part of the cylinder, and puts into action the turbine, which starts and keeps up ihe propulsion of the projectile. It is said that these projectiles have a considerable speed, and that their revolution on their own axes tends to produce acurate aim. They undoubtedly can produce destructive effects. The French claim that they possess aerial torpedoes which are superior ro the German type described tbove. but of the details of these we cannot speak, any more than we can discuss our own developments.

MAMMOTH AEROPLANES NECESSARY.

Lately experiments have been made by Captain Alessandro Guidoni at Spezzia, in Italy, in launching torpedoes from seaplanes, and ae has succeeded in launching one weighing 730 lb., and hitting the object aimed ,it nine times out of ten from a distance of one and a half miles.

The Germans are using, or planning to use, their torpedoes from aeroplanes. To do so effectively they must have very large aeroplanes, by means of which the general offensive properties can be prodigiously increased. The question is frequent'y asked: Is it worth while building very large airships on the lightor-than-air principle? Is it not in opposition to science to spend large sums to push so large a resisting body against the air, merely to he able to use it in certain states of atmosphere? Is not I he loss ot Zeppelins, both in peace and in war, an example of the revenge of science n the transgression of her strict laws? Nations continue to use rdrsliips ; n spite of their imperfections, because they possess certain useful features that the aeroplane does not yet afford, such as considerable weight-lifting powers, which enable such accessories as aerial torpedoes to he successfully employed. THE GREAT PIONEER. But the nation that aspires to the supremacy of the air—and jt is the British Empire that must secure it should leave no effort untried so to improve the aeroplane that it can effectively carry high motive power, an abundance of offensive weapons —ma-chine-guns, bombs and aerial torpedoes, as already do the Zeppelins. No doubt in constructing these mam. moth aeroplanes we shall have to etrace our steps to history and learn again from Wen ham —that great pioneer of human flight, who first pro] iscd the vital principles of superposed surfaces in flying machines at the first meeting of the Aeronautical Society 'if Great Britain in I^G6. Wenham worked before his age. In pntiem-e he lived for most of his lite in the fear that bis name would be •'writ in water,'' but not long before he died there wore the glimmerings that his name would lie immortal in the history of human flight. The biplane showed the value of fiis teachings: but for the giant aeroplanes of the future tb." sustaining surwill have to be more multiple than two, because such fxt'-.i weights as bombs and aerial torpedoes can then ho distributed evenly ov -r the entire surface. Already we sry> the beginning of the weight-carrying aeroplanes. I.efore the war Rus-da had produced Hie Sv-kor-k? aeroplane, whose sustaining <.urfacc \va< F- r ' -ouave mef-ns and its motive power 100 h.o. v>'.v America is r-on-tnietiiig the Co-h- Hulano living boat, v.hcli will •-proad a surtace of 4,000 square f ■■•'■! and !W

STEERED AGAINST AIRSHIPS BY ELECTRIC WAVES.

Besides the aerial torpedoes described above the future may reveal great possibilities for another kind —one steered from the earth by wireless electric waves.

Many people have seen the iretty experiments of steering a small navigab'e baloon in a Lecture room from a distance merely by invisible electric waves. There seems no reason why much larger unmanned aircraft carrying torpedoes should not be thus steered against enemy airships. Anyhow, experiments to investigate such possibilities would justify an exceedingly large expenditure.