FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1931
1931 - 0069.PDF
FLIGHT, JANUARY 23, 1931 A sunset scene at Wadi Haifa. Both this and the photograph at Asiut were taken on the ground with the cinema camera. _ The film contains many fine views of Egypt, both aerial and otherwise, and, besides showing the Imperial Airways flying boats in operation at Alexandria and a Dornier Wai belonging to the Italian Air Line, it gives a vivid impression of the amount of flying flonr in the Hast by the Royal Air Force. One of the captions in the film is ' The Watch on the Desert.' This shows formations of planes operating near Khartoum. There are many views of tombs and other ancient places of Egypt of the highest archaeological interest. " The scenes were taken the whole way ' Down the All-Red Air Route ' shortly to be opened by Imperial Air- ways. One of the scenes shows natives in .Vorthern Uganda standing some distance away from me, being terrified of my 'plane. They afterwards got used to it, however, and another picture shows some of the village belles attired only in a string of beads, standing in front of the 'plane. A striking scene is an aerial view of vast forest fires raging in Uganda, which at certain times of the year make visibility very poor. In Kenya Colony I obtained some aerial views of game, and there is an amusing picture of a large rhinoceros running away as fast as his legs can carry him, whilst my 'plane was only a few feet above him. Another fine shot was obtained from * air of the millions of flamingos which «ve on Xakuru. " Before leaving East Africa I flew °ver Mounts Kilimanjaro and Kenya, obtaining remarkably fine pictures "in ne hFst aerial films yet taken of the wo highest mountains in Africa I 7 considerable difficulty in filming "« Jormer, as the air was extremelv fanned and the machine kept on cushioning' as I approached the " Other views are of Dar-es-Salaam, the country between here and Dodonia showing the hundreds of miles of floods in Tanganyika, scenes in Northern Rhodesia, N'Dola, Salisbury, Pretoria, Johannesburg, Bloemfontein and Cape Town, with, of course, views of the intermittent country. One of the most amusing scenes was taken in Northern Rhodesia, where 1 noticed two old centenarian natives catching drops of oil from my engine cowling and anointing themselves with it. They were greatly pleased when I handed them the remains of a Shell oil tin, and one of their comrades proceeded to give them a regular bath in it. Afterwards they shone like bronze, and were so pleased with what I had done that they followed me round as though I might have been a god who had performed some kind of miracle. " Altogether the film is 8,500 ft. in length, and gives a very good idea of the country to be flown over by Imperial Airways. At a private showing in Johannesburg the South African Press described the film as magnificent." Mr. Roy Tuckett is on the left, while alongside him is an official of the Port Elizabeth Club where Mr. Tuckett originally learnt to fly. The Goodyear air wheels which originally went out to Africa for Mr. John Carberry's Moth should be noted. A vlf,y of one of the Nile canals at Asiut at sunset. 71
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
