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Aviation History
1947
1947 - 0790.PDF
•460 FLIGHT MAY 22ND, 1947 industry, which is held to be suffering an "acute finan- cial emergency." It is significant that the agitation, which has resulted in the introduction of a Bill in Con- gress, has its origin largely in Service circles (General Carl Spaatz, C.-in-C. of the U.S. Army Air Forces, is reported to have taken part in preliminary talks), and the '' Dunkirk '' held up to the American people is that the United States is being outdistanced by Russia and Great Britain in design, research and production. By way of adding realism, bombers were used in a mock attack on the American eastern seaboard. One cannot, of course, entirely dissociate the present campaign from the fear that the Republican Government is likely to use whatever may be the American equiva- lent of our '' Geddes Axe '' period which followed World War I, and thus it is not, perhaps, necessary to take the present scare too seriously, but that there is a fire of not inconsiderable magnitude causing the smoke ap- pears fairly certain. We in this country have our own troubles and diffi- culties* The privately owned American airlines are show- ing a loss. So are our State-owned corporations, at least two of the three ; but they are operating under much less favourable conditions Our aircraft manufacturing in- dustry is not exactly flourishing, but it is hampered by shortages in men and materials rather than by serious lack of orders; and it has not been burdened with over- size and now redundant factories to the extent that its American counterpart has. The Navy WinsE ARLY this year Mr. Lindgren briefly announced the Government's decision not to- follow the re- commendations of the Pakenham Committee, which had examined possible sites for a permanent fly- ing-boat base, and which preferred Langstone Harbour to CONTENTS Outlook : Study in Support - KZ-VII in the Air Activities at White Waltham - - - The Ypenburg Rally - - Essex Aero Sprite - - Naval Aircraft - - Here and There - - - - Percival Merganser - - - - - American Newsletter - - - - Civil Aviation - - - ... Correspondence -.*... Service Aviation 459 461 464 465 - 466 467 468 470 472 475 477 481 482 Cliffe. Not until now has the full text of the Committee's report been published. It shows quite clearly the reasons for the preference for the Langstone Harbour site: excellent weather and comparatively low cost. ("The Harbour is almost landlocked, and all the benefits of an impounded lagoon could be obtained by the construc- tion of three relatively small barrages and the strengthen- ing of the retaining bank where required.") In the Memorandum on the Report the Ministry of Civil Aviation gives only one reason for abandoning the Langstone Harbour site : the technical installations in the neighbourhood of Portsmouth are difficult to move. When one considers that Langstone has a much better weather record than the Thames estuary, that the work of making the Harbour suitable would cost far less than would the building of an artificial lagoon at Cliffe, and that flying-boat traffic from it would not cut across the air routes to the Continent, as would that from Cliffe, the Government's reason does not sound very convincing. •>," Flight " photograph BREWING UP : A Vampire breaks away after contributing with its four 20 mm. guns to the fiery demise of a Halifax and Lancaster—targets for offensive support demonstrations at Westdown Ranges. An account of these demonstrations appears on the following pages.
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