"AERIAL OMNIBUS."

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 227, 30 October 1909, Page 4

"AERIAL OMNIBUS."

MR. CODY'S TRIPS WITH PASSENGERS. Loudon, September 10. ' Mr. Cody turned his aeroplane at j AMershot this evening into what he jocularly termed an aerial omnibus. From time to time he has promised , people llig'Dts with him in his machine. This afternoon, seeing that the evening conditions would be ideal, he issued inj vitations to come to the aeroplane e&ed ,*'l will institute the first aerial jM6senigcr service across Laffan'a Plain" he i said.

Captain Brooke-Smith, of the Royal I Engineers, was the first passenger. Mr. | (July rose easily in the air with the double load, sped to the end of the plain, . I urned smoothly, and returned. It was I a .two-mile flight. "With my passenger and myself on : board," he explained, "the aeroplane I weighs more than a ton. It is a big weight -to *(jnd flying through the air I without gas to support it, is it not?" | "Magnificent!" said Captain Brooke- ! Smith, describing how he felt in the air. | 4 \ r iie sensation is a mixture of motoring land ballooning." I "'Next passenger," cried Mr. Cody. •Who collects the fares?" asked a I humorous onlooker.

| "That will come more, quickly than I think—an aerial passenger service between town and town I mean," an I swered Mr. Cody quickly. Captain King, also of the Royal Engineers, next jumped to a seat in the ■ aeioplane. Mr. Cody flew with the preje:4?on of a train over the same two-mile '<i(:'jre, and alighted within a few yards loi his stai ting-point. 'lt's like an omnibus ride down the -Strand,'* ue said, smiling. "Who is my | next passenger?" ( Captain Garden, one of the chiefs of !I V; balloon factory, came forward. lis, I too. enjoyed a smooth 'two-mile ride. | Mr. Cody started and stopped the aeroI plane just as though it were a motoric*.'r. The machine swept Out and back | thirty or forty feet in the ai.r with the , regularity of an express train. I FQttTY MILES AN HOUR.

'Come along, come along, who is next? 1)0 not keep the aeroplane omnibus waiting." cried Mr. CJody 011 coming to earth with Caotain Cardcn. "We are starting now. Who i 6 for Latfan's Plain?"

Mr. Robinson, connected with the firm of fabric-makers whose material covers Mr. Cody's aeroplane, stepped forward, smiling. "All aboard," said Mr. Cody, lie accelerated his engine nnd the aeroplane rose gracefully. Fifty feet high it eoared. Us speed was forty miles an hour. Then, after doing the two-mile trip over precisely the same course, Mr. O'dy landed exactly at tile same point from which he had started.

"It is" a wonderful anticipation," said Mr Robinson, discussing the trip, "of the time when aeroplanes may be plying for hire, picking up fares, and dropping them again just like motor-cabs." His son Leon was Mr. Cndv's last passenger. Flying at a considerable height, h;< passed ofT ha flan's Plain toward* the ba'ioon factory. There he came down jind had a chat with some officers. When ine started to fly back to his garage it | vac almost dark, making it , Serous for flight, and he discovered also I that he W as short of lubricating oil. | £o Mr. Cody wheeled his aeroplane : buck to r,is shed in the gathering darkH )0 . lighted by cyclists jWith their lamps.