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Aviation History
1947
1947 - 2178.PDF
702 FLIGHT DECEMBER ISTH, ig47 CORRESPONDENCE The Editor does not hold himself responsible jor the views expressed by correspondents. The names and addresses of the writers, not necessarily jor publication, must in all cases accompany letters. I WOMEN PILOTS " Paid to be Careful, Not Brave " N reply Jo your correspondent, Mr. F. S. Symondson Flight,December 4th) may I start by saying that I was privileged to serve in the "W.A.A.F. prior to my secondment to theA.T A., and though the Service was my first loyalty, I must in all honesty confirm that th^re werVipnumerable instanceswhere women demonstrated their-equality and, on occasions, their superiority. '~~~\ With all due deference, a pupil kndws more of the mentalattitude oi his or her workmates than any instructor, and there was a definite tendency among ex-R.A.F. secondedpersonnel to regard the A.T.A- as an effete and drone-ridden organization from which they could learn nothing they didnot already know. Anyone who was employed on taxi duties hp.s vivid and bitter memories of dreary hours spent sittingin Flying Control while some super " birdman " with silver wings transmuted into gold did a square search over Englandlor his missing destination Concerning Mr. Symondson's remarks on weather and howex-R.A.F. flew (sic), perhaps he does not know that, in r945, three very good friends ot mine were killed within a weekthrough no other reason than an excess of zeal for '' pressing on." They were all ex-R.A.F. with operational experience.Their one weakness was that they Knew. The women pilots in A.T. A. did not ask for any praise. Wedid not feel that we were entitled to admiration any more than the men pilots. Most of the time we worked as hardas they did, and we certainly endured any hardship or dis- comfort that might have occurred with equal fortitude. Ithink we flew our share, and if we did abandon nights due to weather conditions it was not necessarily inefficiency, it wasrather because we were "Paid to be Careful, not Brave." (Your handling notes. Mr. Symondson.) This is a controversial subject on which there will alwaysbe dissention. I have watched the correspondence developing with considerable amusement, and why the male sex shouldsingle us out for attention I am at a loss to understand. I can only assume that something must have acted as a challengeto evoke this spate of verbosity. Could it be our efficiency? ROSEMARY L. GIBBS, Ex-A.T.A. Woman Pilot. AUTOMATIC PILOTING The Need to Meet Present ConditionsM R. MEREDITH Flight, November 27th) in his teply tomy letter, appears to have become somewhat confused in his gallant, but quite unnecessary defence of the Govern-ment scientific workers on instrument-landing problems. He will find nothing in my letter even suggesting that there mightbe complacency in their department. In fact, I rather suspect that the only reason why B.L.E.U. have not been able toachieve automatic landings, as have the Americans, is because they are held up through lack of a suitable British automaticpilot which has the characteristics of the A-12. Mr. Meredith goes on to explain why he does not considerautomatic pitch trim control and altitude control necessary, although he proposes to provide them eventually; but surelythe reason he is going to do this is because the operators want them, and airline operators are not in the habit of requiringunnecessary equipment. Altitude control is extremely useful during initial approach piocedure, especially when turns haveto be carried out at low altitudes, and although the trim tab servo of the A-12 may not do much work on the Liberator itcertainly does on the DC-6, on which I saw it demonstrated. To state that, in the future, aircraft controls will be suchthat change of trim is small and air traffic control will obviate holding procedure is all very well, but unfortunately, we haveto fly to-day, and are endeavouring now to maintain schedules ; therefore we require an automatic pilot to meet present condi-tions and not the Utopia of the future. I also cannot agree that coarse aircraft control movementsare not necessary on present-day designs to follow the rather erratic and far from straight paths of S.B.A. or I.L.S.especially under cross-wind conditions with varying drift. Mr. Meredith's attempt to belittle fully automatic landingsby calling the phrase "without human control, in the air or on the ground " a cateh phrase, surely shows that he hasnot fully studied the problem. By far the majority of airline accidents to-day are due to human errors in the air or onthe ground. This leads one to the conclusion that under certain conditions the pilot has too much to do, and so makesmistakes. Visualize the case of a pilot with engine trouble approaching under bad visibility conditions, anxiously watch-ing for the break clear. Some day, without automatic pitch trim, he is going to forget to look down, check his indicatingmeter and trim manually. When he breaks clear very close to the ground, with a sigh of relief he will disengage his auto-mate pilot, only to find the stick comes smartly back and, before he can recover, his aircraft has crashed on the endof the runway. It shouldn't happen, but then aircraft shouldn't fly into high ground. I suggest Mr. Meredith asks experienced pilots what refine-ments they would consider most useful in an automatic pilot. In a majority of cases, I believe the answer would be " auto-matic altitude control with automatic elevator trim." '"B ' LICENCE." INTENSIVE AIRCRAFT UTILIZATION Two Important Points Overlooked by Mr. House AFTER reading Mr. E. T. House's article " That 3,000 Hoursper Annum " published in Flight on November 20th, I feel that he has created a wrong impression by giving toonarrow a picture, and I would like to comment on one or two points.When Mr. House was discussing the cost involved in obtain- ing the maximum of work from each aircraft, he seemed toimply that night work on maintenance should be avoided. This means that aircraft will be grounded during the day formaintenance, when they could be operating. Assuming that night operations (it any) are in the minority, most of themaintenance could be carried out at night, enabling the air- craft to be ready for operations again the following morning;the extra revenue thus earned by the. aircraft would surely more than compensate for the increase in cost of maintenance. Mr. House also said that short-distance, high-frequencyservices will permit a higher utilization than low-frequency, long-range services. This is not necessarily true, but in anycase high-frequency, long-range services will give an even higher utilization.However, the two main points which have been missed altogether are (i) Integration of Services and (ii) Stand-byAircraft. Integration of Services.—Where it is necessary to operatelow-frequency services over several different routes, a high utilization can only be achieved by integrating the services sothat the best use is made of the aircraft. Stand-by Aircraft.—As stand-by aircraft are necessary toensure a reasonable degree of regularity, used intelligently they can also be made to ensure punctuality, by introducinga stand-by aircraft when a departure delay is imminent due to the late arrival of an incoming aircraft scheduled to operatethat service. This allows the fullest possible utilization ol the operating aircraft without sacrificing the necessary flexi-bility. As to unpopular timings, is it not a fact that unless thevolume of traffic warranted increasing the frequency of a particular service to such an extent that unpopular timingswere avoidable, this question would not arise? Conversely, I would suggest that unpopular timings are more often theresult of integrating services on too many routes at too low a frequency, to try to achieve an economic utilization. R. E. GREEN. FORTHCOMING EVENTS Dec. 18th.—Royal Aeronautical Society : "The work of the High-SpeedTunnel." Prof. A. Thorn, M.A., D.Sc, and W. G. A. Perring, F.R.Ae.S.Jan. 5th.—R.Ae.S. (Derby) : " Aircraft Photography." John Yoxall. Jan. 6th.—R.Ae.S. (Belfast) : " Some Experiences in ExperimentalGliding." Prof. Hill, M.C., M.Sc, M.I.Mech.E., F.R.Ae.S. Jan. 7th.—R.Ae.S, (Southampton) : " Rotating Wing Aircraft." C. G.Pullin. Jan. 7th.—British Interplanetary Society : " The Man-Carrying Rocket." R. A. Smith, F.B.I.S.Jan. 15th.—R.Aa.S. (Gloucester and Cheltenham) : Film on Rocket Flight. Jan. 24th.—Helicopter Association of Gt. Britain : Lecture by H. M.Yeatman, M.A., A.F.R.Ae.S.
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