THE MAKING OF AN AVIATOR.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 219, 14 December 1916, Page 2

THE MAKING OF AN AVIATOR.

Pluck, skill and resource arc not the only requisites to become a skilled aviator, particularly for service in the Royal Flying Corps, says an English, writer. The successful flying man must be temperamentally of the right type. A man may be a fine athlete and of indomitable courage, but still possessed of a nervous temperament which will handicap him in the air, and curiously enough he may not know it until he is actually put to the test. An instance was cited of an English officer who wished to exchange from his regiment at the front into the Royal Flying Corps. He obtained the coveted permission, but while on leave he wisely decided to take the opportunity of making an ascent to see what flying really was like, and satisfy himself as to his fitness or otherwise for the job. Accordingly he asked the pilot to do all the daring stunts which he could execute, and the pilot duly obliged. He "banked" at the acutest angles, executed a volplane, and was passing merrily from one feat to another, when the passenger found that the situation was getting the better of him. He shouted

' to the pilot, who took the cries, however, as an encouragement to further efforts, and the more daring did the pilot become. When he descended, to his surprise he found that his "fare" was all but in a state of collapse. He had had more than enough, and reluctantly abandoned his intention on the spot of ever becoming a pilot and returned to his regiment at the front.