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Aviation History
1928
1928 - 0009.PDF
JANUARY 5, 1928 EASTWARD HO! Some Comparative Notes on the Big Flights to the East WE have received from Armstrong Siddeley Motors, Ltd.,the following interesting notes comparing certain of the big flights that have been accomplished at various times betweenEurope and the East. These notes are supplemented by a graph, prepared from one which recently appeared in ourcontemporary L'Illustration, and which shows at a glance the performances put up by various pilots during the last fouryears. With the great obstacle of the Atlantic blocking the waywestward it is perhaps natural that the flight to the East in view of the fact that the machine carried a heavy load ofmail. The next best performance was put up by Challe who, inthe same time, reached Saigon, this side of Singapore, a distance of several thousand miles short of Lt. Koppen'sjourney. Other historic flights on the same route are those of Brock and Schlee who reached Rangoon (6,010 miles) in justover ten days, Costes who flew over 5,000 miles in seven days, and thereby equalled Koppen's time for the first part of thejourney. Dc Pinedo who flew a seaplane westward from AmsterdamLondon PAR 13 MunichRome Naples TarantoBelgrade SofiaBucarest Athens LTKOPPEN 1927 O5TE5 1926 ©• • CHALLE -I9£7 '"" '-' ;••••• EN!OCK& 3CHLEE 1927 ©__=„—^ <-dc PINEDO 1925 -PELLETIE3 DOISY-1934- ConstantinopleAlexandria Basra Bushire Bandar- Abbas— Jask AllahabadBenares Pitna 5 b 7 & 9 10 II 12 15 M- 15 16 17 tg NUMBER OF DAYS EASTWARD HO ! The above chart gives a graphic comparison of the principal long-distance flights between Europe and the East during the last four years, of which Lieut. Koppen's stands out prominently. has attracted the attention of European aviators on the look- out for records. The surveying of a possible air mail service is one of the principal objects of these long-distance flights, while the kudos attaching to the pilot, aeroplane and engine which makes a successful flight is another. At the moment it is particularly gratifying to know that Great Britain ranks foremost, at any rate, so far as aero engines are concerned, in this race to the East. We refer to the record-breaking flight made by the Dutch Aviator Koppen in an Armstrong Siddeley " Lynx " engined Fokker which journeyed from Amsterdam to Batavia in Dutch East Indies in ten days and returned equally rapidly, his performance being all the more creditable Bankok and covered some 6,300 miles in 12 days and Pelletier and Doisy who took 18 days to fly nearly 7,000 miles from Paris to Saigon. The average speeds of the various aviators can be taken as an indication of the progress made in navigation and aero engine design. Koppen's " Lynx " engined machine averaged 37£ m.p.h., Challe's speed was 32J m.p.h., while that of Pelletier and Doisy in 1924 was only \1\ m.p.h. Even this last performance compares favourably with the speed of the mail boat which journey only averages some 12 J m.p.h. The aeroplane speeds naturally appear low because the aeroplane only flies by day, and the time spent in resting at night is not deducted when working out the averages.
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