WHERE ARE ENGLAND'S AIRSHIPS?

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3198, 26 May 1909, Page 3

WHERE ARE ENGLAND'S AIRSHIPS?

The Britash public is beginning to awaken to the fact that in conquest of the air Great Britain i 3 being left ibehand. This week, writes a London soeamespordetit under date April St-h, saw the first evidence of public activity on this question, in tha shape of a meeting at the Mansion Hoiase under the auspices of the Aerial League of the British Empire—a .league which aims securing for the Empire the same supremacy in the air as is now enjoys on the sea. Among those on the platform were Admiral Sir Percy Scott, Sir Hiram Maxim, Colonel Cody, Sir William Freece, and the High Commissioner for New .Zealand. The speeches that were made and the letters that were read -all laid stress on the backwardness of England in regard to aviation, and contrasted English apathy with the spirit of progress shown and the results achieved by other nations in this new science. For aviation is now a practical seieace, and supremacy will rest with the nation which is the first to master it. Last year, when Count Zeppelin's first airship was wrecked,'the German people subscribed £2,75,000 in a few weeks to rebuild the ship and to that sum the German Government added £24,000. The spirit shown by the Germans is an object-iesson to slow-moving England. Last week the Zeppelin airship not only rode out a gale in safety, but completed a journey of 250 miles. Presently Germany will have a fleet of airships capable of equalling, and perhaps excelling, this performance, while England thas only one small aii'ship of obsolete type, and is spending a few thousands on elementary experiments where Germany is spending hundreds of thousands in building an aerial fleet. Every voyage that the Zeppelin makes adds to the Germans' knowledge of the air, and puts them further ahead of the English. It is the same with aeroplanes. While foreign competitors are spending money on machines and gaining invaluable experience, no prizes have been offered to enable the British inventors to set to work. The solitary army aeroplane is a hopeless machina, which merely excites ridicule, and even it has not had a fair chance through lack of funds, Yet-the only defence against flying machines will be to meet tham with flying machines, and when other countries are building them England cannot afford to lag behind. Admiral Scott told the Mansion House meeting that he had desinged a gun which would "play old Harry" with airships within a distance of 6,000 ft; but he was careful to point out thgt airships would make their attacks in the darkness, and he had yet to meet the person who could tell him how to hit an object you cannot see. If airships are to be a menace to the navy and the cities and arsenals of England, they will have to be met by airships. Scientists are amazed at the advance that has been made in aerial navigation during the last year or so. No one anticipated, such extraordinary progress in so short a time. At the present rate of progress, says Sar Hiram Maxim, we shall certainly have machines within a few years that will travel at iha rate cf 60 miles an hour to carry a load of 1,5001b. It will therefore be seen that a perfectly unique system of warfare is at hand. It has come, whether we like it or not ; aiid it is a problem that has to be faced. 01' this there an be no question. We have, in fact, arrived at the beginning of a totally new epoch in warfare; the changes which are bound to take place will be quite as great as the changes wrought by the discovery of gunpowder, and on account of th 3 facility of manufacture, the change will more rapid. In the opinion of Sir Hiram Mixim, however, the advent of the flying machine will have a strong tendency to do away altogether with warfare between the highly-civilised nations. But that is a problem for the future.