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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 2176.PDF
142 FLIGHT. AUGUST 5, 1937. ZURICH INTERNATIONAL—II The End of a Great Flying Week : Britain's Fury Pilots Raise a Cheer FRIDAY in the Zurich Inter national Week came like the lull before the renewed storrh. Prac tically all the notables took the day off in readiness for what promised to be a hectic week-end. Dubendorf Airport was preparing for its biggest show yet after the previous Sunday's experience, when 80,000 of Zurich's 200,000 population turned up. Our own Fury contingent was trans ported by car to Lucerne, but not until they had done a modicum of work for their livings. Although the majority of them had attended most of the night long festivities they were all out at Dubendorf by 9 a.m. For half an hour they put in some practice for their dis plays on Saturday and Sunday. When they left it was to make way for the Italian fighter squadron, mounted on Fiat C.32 machines. It had been the general opinion that France had shown up best in formation work for polish and finish, but the Italians made up for plenty with their superior dash. For exactly an hour they rehearsed putting up a good many formations new to one used to the more refined British exhibi tions. Besides normal Squadron "V" —with the tenth machine's propeller bit ing just behind the leader's tail—they flew in " H " and " T " formation; then a dive in "V," ending with a completely vertical turn to port by all ten; two loops in flights of five, the second ones ending,beneath 200 feet • the ten looping in line astern, this time with the last man coming practically to ground level by the time he'd finished; looping in fives and half-rolling into another half loop; roll ing in fives—finishing somewhat rag gedly ; starting rocket loops in fives from 20 feet and stall-turning off the top to Air Vice-Marshal E. L. Gossage, A.O.C., No. 11 (Fighter) Group—which group embraces No. (F.) Squadron, four of whose Furies visited the meet ing—chatting with Herr Von Gronau, president of the German Aero Club. dash into that spectacu lar form of converging attack immortalised at Hendon in the great past by the Navy's Flycatchers; finally a spectacular roll in the odd formation of a leading flight of five linked to the rear three by two intermediate line-astern people. Such were the Italians. To be noticed after the Fiat turn was the generously spatted and radiatored Dewoitine 510 fighter monoplane that claims 250 m.p.h. for itself. Its stan dard equipment includes a driving mirror giving its pilot a fairly satisfactory view of sky behind his tailplane. A German pilot, Stoer, in a Mes- serschmitt 35, began his individual dis play with a loop that turned into a steady upside-down dive. He continued his dive, to pull his fin off the grass with what looked like ten feet to spare. The rest of his show was in the same tradition. The gliders deserve their own mention. One is assured that the club members who fly them spend about 100 francs— roughly five pounds—a year on their sport. The machines were dragged up in pairs and cast off to formate down. Quite obviously they had to force them selves down to be grounded from 1,500 feet inside their ten minutes' allowance. The Italians put up an original formation aerobatic show on Fiat C32 biplanes, one of which is seen here. Note the long aileron mass balances. They finally chased one another down a tight spiral, sideslipped in and settled within 20 yards of each other bang out side their own enclosure. And nobody on the aerodrome considered it deserving of special applause. Two of Belgium's Hispano-powered Fairy Foxes showed they were as fast as most dog-fighters at Dubendorf, three Czechs landed with the ropes still unbroken, and that just about finished Friday, except for the arrival by Swissair from London of A. V.-M. Gossage to see the Furies perform next day. Meeting him at Dubendorf were Group Capt. Colyer, our Air Attache in Paris and Group Capt. Medhurst, outward bound for Italy. Group Capt. Don, our Berlin Attache, was also in Zurich. The Furies Without getting carried away by patriotic fervour we can hand it to the Furies at Saturday's post-final show. The actual evolutions of the "diamond" formation are well known enough in England, since they were seen at the Hendon Display, and at Zurich they were not varied. But in the quiet, business like finish and polish of the display the British team excelled. One of the Furies in the flight, incidentally, was actually among the first batch ever delivered to the Air Force, a good many years back now. General Milch was more than kind in his remarks to Donaldson, Hanks, Walker and Boxer when they got down. And our pilots were the only ones to get a separate cheer from the enclosures after they had left their machines to walk back to their seats. Very satisfying indeed. Count von Hagenburg opened the afternoon's serious business with the kind of aerobatics we have come to ex pect from competent German pilots in Biicker jungmeisters. He had been up side down and rolled right way up again by the time he crossed the aerodrome boundary after taking-off. The French Patrouille d'Etampes in its parasol Moranes (490 h.p. Gn6me Rhfines) did not live up to their justly
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