THE AERIAL AGE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 43, 12 August 1911, Page 9 (Supplement)

THE AERIAL AGE.

WOXDEUI'TL ACCOMPLISH MKNTS. The progress in the art of aerial navigation is one of the marvels of present times. A few years ago one would have scoffed at the idea that in the year 1911 a flight of 1000 miles across country would have been successfully accomplished. Beaumont and other birdmen did this last week for the Daily Mail prize of £IIO,OOO, while even greater aerial feats have been performed in other countries. The aviators opened the present flying season with the following achievements standing to their credit: An entire working day of more than eight hours spent in an aeroplane; a speed of more than 100 miles an hour; a crosscountry flight of 365 miles; a flight of

two miles (11,474 ft) above the earth; a dozen passengers carried six miles; the perfecting of an aeroplane that can rise from land or from the water. Seven men have flown across the English Channel. One aviator flew from London to Paris in a little more than three hours without a stop; another flew from Oheppey, near London, to Mons, in Belgium, a distance of 169 miles; another from Paris to Bordeaux (370 miles) in a single day; another carried a passenger from Paris to the top of a mountain 4500 ft high in the south of France, the condi- 1 tions of the feat being so exacFing that a year ago it was doubted if they would ever be fulfilled. Yet another, Chavez, flew over the Alps from France to Italy, crossing the mountains at an altitude of more than 7500 ft. Recently no less than six aviators hovered over the OxfordCambridge boat race and watched the spirited contest going on on the Thames bplow. These pvery-day achievements of the men of the air, collated by the New York edition of World's Work, mark what great stability is now being acquired in aerial navigation. There are now 510 licensed aviators in Europe, of which number 339 belong to France, 43 to Germany and 39 to England. In America also there are many experimenters, and exhibitions have been given in many parts. So far a million dollars has been won by aviators, and this year is expected to add another million to their earnings. Less dramatic than the increases in the altitude and speed records, less dramatic than the trans-Alpine and cross-Channel flights, and yet, in a way, more important to the development of the science of flying, remarks the World's Work writer, is the turn which the inventors and builders of machines are taking. The vast amounts of money, of energy, and of brain work that have been, in th'e past, largely dissipated by thousands of inventors in widely divergent channels are now being concentrated upon the improvement of successful types of machines. The enthusiasm born of practical, successful accomplishments sweetened with popular applause is urging both builders and aviators to greater efforts and more finished work, though in general outline types do not differ very greatly from those of two years ago. . There has been a considerable increase in improvements to give security and facilitate control, and there have been great developments in the aeroplane motor, one of the chief factors in the attainment of high speed. M. Bleriot predicts that aeroplanes will soon be faster than any other means of transportation. The greatest speed yet recorded was made by Lieutenant Fequent, accompanied by Lieutenant Key, from Mourmelon to Rheims. They covered the 16 miles between these two cities at a speed of more than 100 miles an hour. Henry Weyman was a close second in going over the same course at the rate of 99.5 miles per hour. Both of these flights, however, were made with the assistance of a favorable wind, which added materially to the speed of the machines. There is hardly any limit to the speed which might be attained with a favoring wind, for balloons with no power at all have been known to travel faster than 100 miles an hour before a hurricane. The passenger-carrying ability of machines has received as much attention as has their speed. Passen-ger-carrying machines are now considered standard both for army work and general use, which means that the popularity of the aeroplane is doubled. While the attention of the aviator is absorbed in handling the machine, his passenger may observe the many interesting sights below. He may operate wireless telegraph instruments, sketch, or take photographs. The English aviator, GrahameWhite, who has recently had as a passenger Mr. A. J. Balfour, once British Premier, and who has carried more notS

able people in his machine than has any other air-pilot, is an advocate 6f an extensive passenger-carrying aeroplane and the establishment of regular passengercarrying services. In fact, the taxi-plane is already announced and Aviator Erbster is scheduled to operate it for the Campagnie Aericnne at Lucerne, where flights will be paid for at so much per hours, which the taximeter will register. What has been accomplished in the other branches of aerial service—the dirigibles —is detailed by the same magazine. Everyone knows of the failures of the Zeppelins, but it is not generally known that between August 1, 1910, and January 31, 1911 (180 days), the Parseval VI., another German airship, made 200 excursions from different ports in Germany and did nearly 1000 miles of flying besides. During that time this one ship carried 550 passengers at £lO a head, earning one-half its cost in these six months. During all this time the Parseval VI. did not once fail to reach its destination, not even when it flew from Berlin 309 miles to Munich under a contract with the city government to make 35 trips to the Bavarian Lake Region, or when, on October 22, 1910, it flew from Berlin 184 miles to Kiel and returned. Airship travel, it will th«s be seen, is not an experiment or an adventure in Germany. It is a sane way of flitting from one place to another. Running airship lines is a business, not a sport. While the Germans have been doing all

I this, the Compagnie Airienne, of France, ) has had in commission a little dirigible about half the size of the Parscval VI., named the Ville do Lucerne. With this ship, in the summer, it ran a passenger service from Lucerne around the Rigi and Bergenstock to Zug, making the fifty miles in about two "ITours. When winter came on the Ville de Lucerne went down to Pau, near the foot of the Pyrenees. There is made 134 trips and carried 804 passengers. At the end of a year the ship had paid for itself. "Even the most sceptical," remarks the magazine from which we have drawn these facts, "must acknowledge the success of the dirigible transportation lines, for the ships make trips with regularity and safety, and attract enough patronage to make the business pay."