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Aviation History
1947
1947 - 0513.PDF
andAIRCRAFT ENGINEER Editorial Director Editor Assistant Editor • Art Editor • G. GEOFFREY SMITH, M.BA C M. POULSEN MAURICE A. SMITH, D.F.C, (WING CDR.. RAf.V.RJ JOHN YOXALL FIRST AERONAUTICAL WEEKLY W THE WORLD .• FOUNDED WO9 Editorial, Advertising and Publishing Offices: DORSET HOUSE, STAMFORD STREET, LONDON, S.E.I Telegrams : Flightpres, Sedist, London. Telephone : Waterloo 3333 (SO lines.) COVENTRY: BIRMINGHAM, 2: MANCHESTER, 3 : GLASGOW, C2 : 8-10, CORPORATION ST. K"]jG EDWARD HOUSE, 260, DEANSGATE. 26B. RENFIELD ST. Telegrams: Autocar, Coventry. Tyeiroms . Autopress, Birmingham! Telegrams: Iliffe, Manchester. Telegrams : Iliffe, Glasgow. Telephone : Coventry 5210. Telephone: Midland 7191 (7 lines). Telephone: Blackfriars 4412. Telephone: Central 4857 No. 1998. Vol. LI. SUBSCRIPTION RATES : Home and Abroad : Year, £3 I 0. Registered at the C.P.O. «,a Newspaper April 10th, 1947 6 months, £1 10 6. Thursdays, One Shilling.. HFe Outlook Aids to Air SafetyN O especial significance should be attached to the fact that it was on April ist that Lord Nathan, the Minister of Civil Aviation, announced in the House of Lords the steps he is taking towards making air transport safer. The announcement was made in reply to a question by Earl Howe, and there was little that was new among the items outlined by Lord Nathan. Lord Cherwell's advocacy of F.I.D.O. was under- standable and must, we think, be shared by all who have taken the trouble to study the problems connected with landing in really bad visibility. But fog-dispersal, whether F.I.D.O. or some other form, should not at the moment be regarded as other than a last resource when all other means have failed. In our issue of March 6th, 1947. we published an article on fog dispersal in which were explained not t>nly the principle and operation of F.I.D.O. but also of other systems, such as the American version, " Elmer,' which is reported to be a good deal cheaper in running costs, s partly because it burns diesel oil instead of petrol. That> advantage, by itself, may be of relatively small lmport- ' ance in that the difference in cost between diesel oil and untaxed petrol is not so very great. There are other systems for which special advantages are claimed, and which were dealt with briefly in he article mentioned. The American Nofog and the French system developed along somewhat simiar lines depend not on heating but on dehydrating the tog, powdered carbon or charcoal mixed with calcium chloride or some other dehydrant being scattered into So^far as can be ascertained at present, all these systems are likely to prove rather expensive in first cost as well as in operating costs, even if the figures for F.I.D.O. quoted by Lord Nathan can be considerably reduced in future. , . , ,,.•,. Of the radio and radar aids to which the Minister referred there is little to say. They have all been de- scribed in this journal at different times and are thus well known to our readers. The important thing is that the Ministry of Civil Aviation is, to use the phrase so popular among politicians, "exploring every avenue." That is as it should be, but it is to be hoped that the period of exploration will have merged into one of ex- tensive general use before next winter; otherwise we are likely to have a repetition of the mishaps which have marred recent months. Lord Nathan's announcement of the sc"tting-up of a scientific committee with Sir Robert Watson-Watt as consultant and with assistance from the radio industry is all to the good. More doubtful is the Minister's inten- tion to appoint a chief scientific adviser. Such an appointment will place very great powers in the hands of one man, and even if he is, as Lord Nathan said, " of the highest professional eminence," the fact remains that he is still human and thus liable to make mistakes. Having appointed him, the Minister must of necessity accept his advice, and he will need to be a great man in addition to being professionally eminent. Naval HelicoptersA CCORDING to the New York Herald Tribune the United States Navy intends to replace destroyersk by helicopters for "plane guard" duties with aircraft carriers at sea. This somewhat staggering bit of information arises out of experience with helicopters during recent U.S. Navy fleet manoeuvres in the Atlantic and Caribbean, when a Sikorsky S-51 (the type which is to be built under licence in this country by Westland Aircraft, Ltd.) was used experimentally not only for escort duties but for intra-fleet flights, including mail-carrying. The suggestion that helicopters could replace escorting destroyers appears at first sight a little far-fetched, bnt the American experience was not, apparently, a mere
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