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Aviation History
1932
1932 - 0852.PDF
FLIGHT, AUGUST 26, 1932 Chart showing route prepared by the Automobile Association. Brunswick, in about 5£ hours. The distance is approxi mately 600 miles. At New York Mollison was given a great reception. Among the sheaves of congratulatory messages received by Mollison and by his wife Amy, we have space to quote but a very few. Mr. Ramsay MacDonald sent the following telegram from Lossiemouth: "A wonderful flight, calling for our heart felt admiration. Many congratulations." From the Air Minister, Lord Londonderry: " On behalf of the Air Council I send you warm congratulations on your great flight from east to west, which has once again given striking proof not only of your personal skill and courage but also of the efficiency of British aircraft and British aero engines." From Lord Wakefield of Hythe: '' My heartiest con gratulations on the success of your record-making flight. I sincerely trust your return flight will be crowned with equal glory to yourself and your country." The Royal Aeronautical Society sent the following: " President and Council of Royal Aeronautical Society send you warmest congratulations on your magnificent flight, a wonderful triumph of British confidence in a British aeroplane.—Pritchard, Secretary." We publish a chart of the route which the Aviation De partment of the Automobile Association had planned for Mr. Mollison. A few words of explanation may be of interest. The shortest distance between the coasts of Ireland and Newfoundland would have been a great-circle course. To fly along this, however, Mr. Mollison would have been obliged to make five changes of course at predetermined points, and would therefore have had to calculate his posi tion with considerable accuracy. Flying solo as he was, this would have presented great difficulty. An alternative would have been to follow a rhumb-line course, but this would also have involved changes of course to correct for the changes of magnetic variation. To overcome these difficulties, the rhumb-line course was taken, and to this was added the average difference in the magnetic variation between Ireland and Newfoundland. On this course the pilot would be north of the rhumb line, as the average magnetic variation at first exceeded the actual. Halfway across the actual and average variation would be the same, and finally on the second half of the Atlantic cross ing the actual would exceed the average variation, and the pilot would find himself gradually approaching the rhumb line. :. THE HEART'S CONTENT Mollison's " Puss Moth " (Gipsy III), which crossed from Ireland to Nova Scotia in 24 hours. (FLIGHT Photo.)
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