The Sun 42 Wyndham Street, Auckland, N.Z. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 1927. ROUND THE WORLD IN A DAY

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 194, 5 November 1927, Page 8

The Sun 42 Wyndham Street, Auckland, N.Z. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 1927. ROUND THE WORLD IN A DAY

PUCK’S boast to put a girdle round about the world in forty minutes has been outdone by the modern inventor. The wizardry of wireless communication can do as much in about as many seconds and there is confident talk of instantaneous television across continents and seas —lovers gazing adoringly at each other ten thousand miles apart, politicians gibing one another on opposite sides of the globe. And radio enthusiasts even hope to put a girdle round about Mars. Indeed, there is no end to quick wonders. The latest prospective marvel is a flight round the world in a day. This is not a fantastic dream. It is the practical vision of Sir Alan Cobham, Great Britain’s greatest air-adventurer, who soon will take wing from London on a 20,000-mile flight round Africa, making much less fuss about it than the Auckland transport authorities will have to make about a tram ride to Avondale. It may be some time yet before the earth has been engirdled by an airman within the span of a day, but famous airmen are confident that, at least, the children of to-day will be able in their wonderful lifetime to fly from Australia to America in twenty-four hours, and from London to New York overnight. By that time, perhaps, the Reform Government may have realised the purposes and progress of aviation, and will have established an air base at Auckland with a fleet of seaplanes, so that -the Mayor and other representative men may he able, if need be, to fly to Wellington in an hour to protest against betting on tin hare coursing or against a brigand’s levy on petrol. But that does not get us round about the world in a day. The alluring iirosizeet is, however, declared to be within the range of possibility. All that is required, says Sir Alan Cobham, is the ability to travel at 1,000 miles an hour, the circumference of the earth being about 24,000 miles on any great circle. This is the way of it. “If we fly against the rotation of the earth, and start at noon on the Equator, going westward, the sun will remain directly above us all the time, and it will be noon at every place we pass over.” It seems simple enough, but there is, of course, a catch in the thing. The speed of the aircraft must be not less than 1,000 miles an hour. It is true that Britain possesses aircraft machines which could fly at that fearful rate, providing it were practicable to develop their full power at an altitude of twelve miles. Experts explain that it requires as much jmwer to drive a machine at 228 miles an hour at sea-level as it does at 1,000 miles an hour at twelve miles altitude. Thus the fastest airmen have to he content to travel at the rate of 300 miles an hour, while the oil kings and petrol purveyors, favoured by Nature, may sleet) easy o’ nights knowing that the density of the atmosphere near the surface of the earth will keep their profits at a high altitude. Meanwhile, the British Air Ministry, though relatively slow to move in the beginning of aviation development, leads all the rest in preparation for round-the-Empire flights. Next year great airships will embark on an experimental service to Canada and along Atlantic air routes where generous trade winds speed the flying' guest. Then there is in prospect through communication by airplane from London to Melbourne by way of India with a branch line from Cairo to Capetown. Big jumps over the sea have ceased to worry air-adventurers, and soon the winged couriers of the Empire air mail will make the romance of modern transportation more fascinating and colourful than all the galleys and triremes of a bygone day. It is a pity that New Zealand is at the tail end instead of in the forefront of aviation progress.