EARLY DAYS IN THE AIR.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 266, 13 April 1917, Page 1 (Supplement)

EARLY DAYS IN THE AIR.

EPISODES IN THE TRAINING OF AN AVIATOR. THE FIRST FLIGHT. ■ ; BY A PILOT. With no small good fortune and the waste of much time I had at last passed the perplexing period of obtaining my commission, and was ordered to report myself at Wwithout delay. It was a bleak spot on the crest or a hill behind the town; wind swept and lonely. Aerodrome was a courtesy title for a wid'e open space, level in parts, bumpy in others, with an unpleasant right-hand slope. Along one side were eight or 'ten hangars, a row of giant sentinels; squatted in front of them aeroplanes of varying shapes and sizes. I was at first treated by the Members of the mess with some disdain; to them I was merely a "quirk" who had yet to prove himself. This was undoubtedly good for me, and helped to detract from the clomd of self glory with which my new uniform had endowed me. I soon learnt that war flying was not the mock heroic business of civilian days,-but rather a matter-of-fact, cold blooded profession. a profession the very intricacies of which overwhelmed me.

AERIAL SLANG. : The quaint terms of the more experienced men puzzled me not a little until I learnt that a. "bus" a more generally understood term than an aeroplane, and that bfong "all of a doodah" was a picturesque way of saying that a pilot had got nervous in mid-air. A "Hun" and a "quirk, I discovered, were young gentlemen of .about my own accomplishments; a "stunt" or "joy ride" indicated a trip in the air; the "joy stick" was that wonderful piece of mechanism that eonrols both ailerons and elevators, and I also learnt that no self respecting airman ever talks of his hat, but rather of his "gadget." My head soon filled with such strange terms as "gas-bags," "bloaters," "B.E.'s," "glides," "bumps," "stream lines." and "nose dives." This was followed by heart breaking struggles with a Morse key and its intricate system of dots and dashes, known in the service as "umptys" and "iddies," and with a Lewis- giun that possessed a hundred and one different traps for the unwary; with parts as numerous as the moods of A woman. To load it. to change the tray, to clean it, to take it to pieces and to refit it. were all lessons of this novel curriculum. There were maps; decent, honest efforts of the Ordnance Survey that wers distorted and re-shaped and reread until they no longer represented inanimate variously coloured plans of the surface of the earth, but were given animation, and bespoke a glorious panorama of brown smudged altitudes, blue lined rivers, green tinted plains grev blotted towns and villages, straight, black lined railways; that were criss crossed into ways; that were criss-crossed into given nglv appelationi such as AC3I. DF22; maps that were to be read by compass and by scale.

TACTICS IN THE CLOUDS. A hoarse voiced, extremely capable warrant officer then pounded into my thick head some small part of the theories of aerial tactics and strategy; to distinguish between "line" and "area" reconnaissances (the one necessitating flying and observing along a lino between two given points on the map. these points having been already marked in before leaving the ground—the other comprising a whole area or district); a few tips on acnal combat and when to attack and when not to attack.

Added to these accomplishments 1 learnt that a war pilot was expected to bo an expert photographer, and to be able to "rig up" and "take down" a wireless telegraphy set. The next day there followed a course on bombs and bomb-dropping with a few remarks about instruments —the "rovmeter," that registered tho number of revolutions tho engme is making per moment; tho "altimeter," for giving the height above sea-level; the compass, tho most necessary adjunct of all to successful flying, and the lighting set for nigiit-flying. At last tho day arrived when I found myself ready for my first trip aloft. I was equipped like an Eskimo in a woollined leather coat and overall trousers, a knitted Balaclava helmet, and over that again a woollen skull cap; the whole t itd down tightly beneath tho chin. A large woollen muffler around my neck and a pair of unsightly goggles completed the picture; my face and hands having already been treated with a generous dose of vaseline, which I hud hceu assured would keep out the cold.

I elambered over into the front seat of tho machine, the engine was started un<l tried, and the whole franio throbbed and shook as tho wheels wore braked by two largo wooden blocks. At last we were really off. 'Swiftly wo sped across tho ground, and tho wind whisth d by our faces. There was a pandenicnuim of no'se, and wo were rising, rising into -space, and as we ro.se t-io noise of the racing engine grew loss.

SHOCKS. Suddenly the unexpected happened. Tho machine lurched over in a mo*t alarming manner. I found myself staring \i\> at the skv. For the first time f felt really frightened, with that fear that i-. only given to the a'rnian to endure. The machine was cot, however, as I believed, trying to hurl itself to the ground below, but was performing tho very usu.il manoeuvre of banking—-turning-though somewhat sharply in n left-band direefc ; on; but I was not reassured unt : l T caught flight of the sn:i!n on the pilot's faca behind me. and then f knew that the angle had been sharper than usual for my own particular benefit, to trv my nerve. Tim worst frudit of all, however, was yet to come. The engine stopped suddenly. Instead of tho steady rythmic rrar, it coughpd and spluttered weak-