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Aviation History
1933
1933 - 1062.PDF
FLIGHT, NOVEMBER 23, 1933 AIRPORT NEWS A: CROYDON NOTHER week of indifferent weather at the Air port of London. What it has shown is that to day it makes very little difference to the regularity of air travel. The other day I met a passenger who had been unable to complete the journey from Copenhagen to London owing to fog at Croydon. The machine had landed at Lympne, and he had been particularly impressed by the smooth way everything was organised there. Very shortly after landing, the passen gers had been taken by car to Folkestone station, pro vided with first-class tickets to London, and put on the train. They were an hour or two late, of course, but the total journey time was enormously reduced in comparison with surface travel. Properly organised alternative air ports make air travel the best means of getting about, even when terminal airports are closed by fog. On Sunday the new scheme of zone traffic control, which is being tried out here, came into force. Only as many inward aeroplanes were allowed to enter the 10-15-mile zone surrounding the airport as, in the opinion of the Control Tower officer, could do so with safety. Machines were " laid off " until their turn came, and, so far as I can gather, the system worked well, considering it was the first day of the zone control. Imperial Airways, Ltd., are constantly on the look-out for improvements. They now have a new experimental caterpillar tractor similar to an Army tankette for tow ing heavy aeroplanes to and from the hangar. It is loaded with heavy weights to ensure grip on the smooth " tarmac apron " (which, in fact, is made of concrete slabs). By the way, the Imperial Airways passenger gangway I mentioned last week is not an attempt to emulate the telescopic gangways used in America. Those stretch from the building to the machine for protection against weather, whereas the British one is only meant to shelter passengers from propeller wind, possible specks of oil, and from wait ing in inclement weather whilst some passenger pauses in the doorway of the machine, as always seems to happen. A telescopic gangway from the building is only possible if but one machine at a time is leaving. Last Sunday the famous Arsenal travelled to Paris by Imperial Airways, Ltd., to play the Racing Club de France. They chartered a special machine, and I imagine found it worth while, for they won their match and re turned to Croydon by air on Monday. The same day six French Members .of Parliament arrived by Air-France " Clipper " to witness our opening of Parliament. Maurice Chevalier (who looks not unlike a country M.P.) also travelled by Air-France during the week. The second D.H. " Dragon " recently delivered to Im perial Airways, Ltd., for pipe-line patrol work in Iraq left Croydon for Palestine on Saturday last, piloted by Mr. Alcock, brother of the late Sir John Alcock. Maj. Willy Coppens, Belgian Air Attache, who really uses his " Moth " as other men use their cars, flew in from Paris in that machine on a day of not too good flying weather during the week. Ridiculous stories have appeared in the English Press about Germany training war pilots simply because the big German machines carry a crew of four in some cases. This merely means a first and second pilot, a wireless operator—essential when telephony is not used—and a fly ing mechanic. It might occur to anyone that it is essen tial to train civil pilots and other members of an aero plane's crew by carrying them to and fro on air liners in winter time, when there is not such a rush for passenger accommodation. The air companies are badly handicapped in the sort of weather we have had lately by lack of " outward " Cus toms clearance facilities from such alternative airports as Gatwick and Gravesend. I heard of a case during last week where a Dutch machine was expected to land at Gravesend owing to weather. It was decided to send the passengers for the outward journey by road to Gravesend to embark. The company, however, could not get Cus toms permission to clear Customs outwards from Graves end, but would have had to fly to Lympne for clearance. It is beside the point that in this case the necessity did not arise, as the machine got through to Croydon. If passengers had been embarked at Gravesend, the pilot would have had to fly across everybody's path to Lympne in bad weather and land there at a time when other machines were perhaps trying to get in in conditions of bad visibility. It might have happened that Lympne was too bad to approach, and then a perfectly feasible flight from Gravesend to Holland would have had to be cancelled. This sort of thing is not good enough, and the authorities who have been requested to grant these simple facilities are endangering traffic by unnecessarily concen trating it on Lympne when bad weather conditions make congestion extremely perilous on the air routes. A. VIATOR. A1 FROM HESTON T 3.15 p.m. on Thursday, November 16, two large airliners landed at Heston. A wireless report stated that visibility at Croydon was 40 yards, and both the four-engined Horatius from Paris and the three-engined Junkers machine from Berlin altered their course to Heston, where school flying had been going on all day under reasonably good conditions. By the time they arrived, an Imperial Airways' motor coach was wait ing, and a " relief " coach arrived soon afterwards. Later, Horatius managed to get back to Croydon. The German machine, however, spent the night at Heston and left next morning at 10.30 with eight passengers for Berlin. Its twin rudders are decorated, one with the German national colours, and one with the ubiquitous swastika. Mrs. Calthrop and Miss Heaton are taking an instrument- flying course with Mr. Brian Davy. Count Weininger, who has just obtained his "A" licence at Heston, came over from Austria to learn to fly. Since the new Airwork-built C.30 P. " Autogiro " com pleted its trials, a repair job on an old-type C.30 has been put in hand. The C.24 cabin type has also been in the shops for extensive repairs, and is now rebuilt and under the spray-painting apparatus. Last week Wrightson & Pearse disguised a " Tiger Moth " and flew to Weymouth to co-operate with Gaumont British Distributors, Ltd., in "Jack Ahoy!" Their " Cirrus II Moth " (at £2 a day, fuel and insurance extra) has been in constant demand for day trips and short holidays. Birkett Air- Service flew pictures from Portsmouth in connection with the Evening Standard page of Armistice Day celebrations. AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL IN BAD WEATHER w IE have already made brief reference to the Croy don Controlled Zone, on which, for some con siderable time now, the authorities have been working, and this was also referred to in more detail by Major Mealing, of the Air Ministry, in his paper before the Royal Aeronautical Society on October 12. On November 19 this scheme came into being and is designed especially to reduce the risks of collision on the London-Continent airway during conditions of bad visi bility. Air Ministry Notices to Airmen, Series A, Nos. 81 1 and 82, of the year 1933, contain full instructions on the subject, and should be consulted in this connection. The new arrangements entaii the cancellation of those parts of the Air Pilot (Vol. I) which refer to " Officially defined air routes," and to " Flight on Croydon-Lympne air route under conditions of bad visibility," also to the officially defined air route zone on Sheet 12 of the £-in. Civil Air Edition Map of England. Accompanying this article will be found a map showing the new officially recognised routes and the controlled 180
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