AIR TRAINING CORPS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 October 1943, Page 2

AIR TRAINING CORPS

MOBILE INSTRUCTION UNIT VISIT TO MASTERTON. GREAT EDUCATIONAL VALUE. An inside view of the technical section of the Royal New Zealand Air Force will be afforded parents and interested members of the public when the Air Training Corps Mobile Instruction Unit arrives at Masterton on Monday afternoon of next week. With the dual purpose of providing a material background to the training of cadets of the Masterton Town Squadron and the Wairarapa College units, and of stimulating recruiting interest by allowing people to gain a first hand impression of the technical side of the Air Force at work, lhe visit has been arranged by the New Zealand headquarters of the A.T.C. in conjunction with the officer commanding the Masterton Squadron, Flying Officer S. V. Playsled.

Consisting of three modern transport vehicles fitted up as mobile workshops and display booths, the unit, which will be located at the parking area of the W.F.C.A. Ltd. during its two days stay, is a new departure in air technical training cither in New Zealand or abroad. In the charge of R.N.Z.A.F. officers, technicians and a driving crew, the unit is in stationary and opened state, is comparable with the elaborate aeronautical pavilion featured at the Centennial Exhibition at Wellington in 1940. Among the large equipment of the unit is, except the wings and tail unit, the full assembly of a Harvard fighter aircraft, which takes up the whole of a special truck, while another display of modern air armament, which includes a modern bomber aircraft’s gun turret, takes the whole of another truck. A third truck is fully laden with aircraft motors ranging from four cylinder, air-cooled motors for Moth aircraft, to multicylinder radial motors for bomber aircraft.

Almost entirely manufactured and assembled in the workshops of the R.N.Z.A.F., the unit travels as a road convoy with the component vehicles known as Number' One, Number Two and Number Three in that order. The first two vehicles are large pantechnicons with sufficient headroom for even the tallest of visitors. Number- One is built to allow the whole of one side to fold down to floor level, the lowered side becoming a platform. Outlining the arrangements for the visit, Flying Officer Playsted, officercommanding the Masterton Town Squadron, said the unit had a very practical value from an educational point of view. “The unit will allow parents to see what a great technical training the servicing section of the A.T.C., and later the R.N.Z.A.F., offers the modern mechanically-minded and air-minded youth,’’ said Flying Officer Playsted. “Samples of work carried by the unit show how Air Force trainees reach an amazingly high standard of work in a matter of weeks, and how finished technicians are trained in a matter of months. The transition from layman to technician in the R.N.Z.A.F. is so rapid that it has to be seen to be believed. The mobile instructional unit offers visual testimony of this fact. The Air Force technician is the most thoroughly trained in the world, and though he can turn out a micrometer, moveable wrench or a pair of callipers from a lump of steel with only a file and a hacksaw, he can also discuss metallurgical theory, mensuration or internal combustion engine science with any expert in the engineering field. PARADE ON MONDAY The Masterton unit of the Air Training Corps will parade on Monday night at°7 o’clock in Queen Street, outside the club rooms, State Theatre building. Headed by the Municipal and Salvation Army bands, the unit will march via Queen Street and Jackson Street to the W.F.C.A. parking area, where the bands will contribute several items. The parade will leave the assembly point at 7.10 p.m. A special display of model aeroplanes, made by the pupils of the Masterton Central School, is on view in a window of the W.F.C.A. Ltd., Queen Street. ESSAY COMPETITION The conditions of the essay competition are: — (1) The competition is open to all young men between the ages of 1G and 20 years. • + a i (2) The subject of the essay is to deal with the demonstration of the Mobile Instruction Unit, together with a general description of the unit. Also the opinion as to the value of such demonstration in promoting interest in the Air Training Corps Recruiting Drive. (3) The essay is to be limited Ito a maximum of 500 words and to be written on one side of the paper only. The name and address of the competitor is to be written on the right hand corner of the first page. (4) No entrance fees. (5) Essays to be addressed to: F. M. Cunningham, Flying Officer, P.O. Box 84, Masterton, and to be in his hands not later than November 10. (6) The winning essay will be published in “Times-Age.’’ (7) Essays will be adjudicated upon by a committee appointed for the purpose and the selection of the twelve best essays will be sent to Wing Commander Nicholls, Commandant, Air Training Corps, Wellington, who will then make the final decision.

(8) Prizes:—lst prize £2 2s; 2nd prize £1 Is, 3rd prize 10s fid.