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Aviation History
1947
1947 - 1809.PDF
0CT03ER I6TH, 1947 FLIGHT 453 CORRESPONDENCE The Editor does not hold himtelj responsible Jor the views expressed by correspondents. The names and addresses 0/ the writers not necessarily for publication, must in all cases accompany letters. AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL The Man-power Puzzle IN your issue of September nth I read an announcement in"the " Civil Aviation News'' that the Ministry of CivilAviation are still unable to put into effect an Air Traffic Con- trol scheme tor the United Kingdom, owing to " manning diffi-culties and l&ck of personnel." Now, in to-day's issue (Sept. 25th) I read a letter by C. C. Allinson, who writes of his pre-vious experience as "Four years Senior A.T.C.O.," etc. Obviously well experienced, yet he goes on to say: "My appli-cations for employment in Civil Aviation have been rejected without even an interview ! " This state of aflairs is all too familiar.- 1 myself have hadsix years in the K.A.F. as a pilot. During that time, I and many of my fellow pilots did "Duty Pilot" (this was beforethe trade of Flying Control Officer was instituted), handling dozens of aircraft, on the circuit, per hour, alone, and at thesame time giving a U/T pilot "all the gen" on airfield pro- cedure and control! Recently I paid a visit to a large"nationalized" airport. In the Control Tower there were: Onf Senior Flying Control Officer; two Junior Flying ControlOfficers; two Airfield Controllers and a W/T Operator; in short, the place was overcrowded, and they handled in thespace of about two hours the huge amount of two aircraft. All this is very puzzling and very contradictory. When 1applied for a position as Air Traffic Control Officer I was offered a job as Airfield Controller, a job which I, and countlessothers had done as very U/T pilots in the R.A.F., and which I disgustedly declined, without thanks! Shortage of man-power, indeed ! R. B. S. HEINKEL 113 Superstition and RenumberingW ITH reference to the mention of the Heinkel He 113 bothby Mr. H. F. King in his book review of Immortal Memory and by Mr. I. Fraser in the correspondence columnsof Flight, Oct. 2nd. I would like to pass on a small piece of information about this elusive aircraft. The German Air Ministry's method of designation was basedou the allocation to each aircraft manufacturer of a batch of numbers which were to be used up as new designs emerged,hence, the Heinkel system was—He 111, He 112, He 113, He 114, He 115, and I believe went as far as 120. Therefore,when a new development of the He 112 fighter was produced, it automatically became the He 113. ; BUT-—the Geiman Air Ministry had reckoned without super-stition and, due to a high accident rate on the new fighter, German pilots considered that the number 13 appearing in thedesignation accounted for the misfortunes connected with the aircraft. Consequently, as no aircraft bore the number 100, this num-ber was adopted for the Heinkel fighter in order to kill the superstition, and in all official references the new designationHe 100 was used. Although this explanation may seem ridiculous, it is, never-theless, true. Mr. King also mentions that the aircraft never'became opera-tional, but one night fighter squadron did receive it as operational equipment. "DINGBAT." On returning from his tour of the French aircraft industry,Mr. M. F. King has commented as follows on the letter of Mr, Fraser October 2nd) and that of "Dingbat" in this issue. The designation He 113 was used in the early days of thewar in captions to German propaganda photographs showing an alleged night fighter squadron. This, no doubt, is the unitreferred to in "Dingbat's" letter. If my memory serves me FORTHCOMING EVENTS Oct. 19th to Nov. 24th—Royal Aero Club of Belgium Air rally to the Belgian Congo. Brussels to Le Kivu. Oct. 21st.—R.Ae.S. (Graduate and Student). " Interplanetary Flight and Rocket Propulsion." A. V. Cleaver, A.F.R.Ae.S Oct. 23rd.—Royal Aeronautical Society : " The Problem of High Tem- perature Alloys for Gas Turbines." Sir William T. Griffiths. _ D.Sc, F.R.I.C., F.lnst.P., F.I.M. . Oct. 25th.—Helicopter Association of Great Britain : "Some Work with _ Rotating Wing Aircraft." O. L. L Fitzwilliams, B.A. Oct. 30th.—Royal Aeronautical Soci and Empire Lecture. ..iety : Third British Commonwealth James Bain. the fuselage markings were the " four-letter " factory codeaiulnot unit markings. I, too, can assure Mr. Fraser that official Luftivaffe and Heinkel documents reler to the type depicted asH 100. The "13," as "Dingbat" points out, was shunned on superstitious grounds, though I am unable to confirm thata high accident rate was the underlying reason. In any case, only a dozen 11 so He 100s were built. Whatever its appellation, the successor to the He 112 (liki-the ii2 itself) was not an operational type, propaganda photo- graphs notwithstanding.As for the state of things on the ground in Kent during the summer of 1940 (see Mr. Fraser's letter), I must admit thatI was not resident in the neighbourhood, being too busy scour- ing it at all Ticvrs (with the wholehearted assistance" of thelocal authorities mentioned by Mr. Fraser), for crashed enemy • aircraft. A small section of" R.A.F. officers, of which 1 hadthe honour to be a member in those days, reported on every enemy crash on Bntish soil. Unhappily, many times 1 dis-covered an alleged Me 109 to be a Spitfire or'Hurricane. Incidentally, I once drove 90 miles after midnight to areported He 113 on some lonelv marshes, so perhaps Mi. Fraser will pardon my anxiety to lay this ghost once and lorall. HANDS OFF THE KITE-HAWK Guided Missiles or Misguided A.M.O.s. ?I AM disgusted to read that some people are again seeking tohave the P.F.F. wings taken down. I feel sure no one entitled to wear the insignia will have made the suggestion, sopresumably somebody else with nothing better to do, or actu- ated by some spite or jealousy, has thought it all out. Tome the idea seems akin to two pilots who have been wounded arguing because the one with the bigger wound has to carrythe same sized stripe, or the man with a Burma ribbon up who, having bten posted to a Bomber Command unit, is toldthat his ribbon must come down because his present unit did not serve in Burma and his overseas unit has been disbanded.There are all too few '' permanent'' Kite-hawk holders left in the Service, although the technique is still current. I had been thinking recently that the R.A.F. must be havinga rough time as a result of their manpower shortages. I am not now so sure if, as reported, " Air Ministry committees arestill sitting" to decide whether P.F.F. aircrew may still wear their "distinctive gilt albatrosses." This does not look likeshortage of manpower. " Hands off ! " I say, " Stop meddling and get on with some-thing constructive." " Such as what? " do I hear? Well, for instance, members of. the public were told at an Air Force"at home" station "We have still not caught up even to where the Germans left off in guided missiles." Peoplemeddling with Pathfinders might employ themselves better in finding a substitute for bombers and pathfinder marking beforewasting time in talking about whether or not a man is entitled to continue to wear the P.F.F. badge he earned during thewar. "T. I. MARKE::." BOOK REVIEW Jane's All the World Aircraft, 1947. Compiled and edited by Leonard Bridgman. Sampson Low, Marslon and Co., Ltd., £3 3s net.I N form, one Jane's looks much like another. In substance,however, the variation from year to year has a real signi- ficance, and a knowledgeable analysis of cause and effect isessential if the full benefit is to be derived from a study of the work. This analysis is, as usual, undertaken in the new-edition by Mr. Leonard Bridgman. He points out, for example, that the absence of Germany and Japan, which last year occu-pied some seventy-four pages, is counterbalanced by increases in the space devoted to nearly every other aircraft manufactur-ing country. France advances from four to thirty-one pages, and many countries which, except for token recognition, wereabsent during the war, have now returned. Particularly im- portant this year are the new data concerning civil aircraft.In any such work completeness is inevitably precluded by printing schedules. Thus one finds no performance data forthe Supermarine Attacker, though these appeared in Flight last May. On the other hand, certain figures are included forAmerican types which have hitherto been little publicized.
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