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Aviation History
1948
1948 - 0374.PDF
314 FLIGHT MARCH I8TH, 1948 Correspondence 2o,oooit above the grouSd and capable of being shifted at shortnotice to the most favourable spot in a relatively wide area. Flight refuelling has already been carried out at such heights,and clearly this is the practice to be aimed at on the North Atlantic route; but I would not agree with Mr. Pearl that thepresent trials will prove little because they are being made in less favourable circumstances. Surely the converse is the case;achievement of an acceptable degree of regularity would be all the more convincing? As to the risks of accident and of passengers being alarmedrather than intrigued, there is much natural difference of opinion which only experience can resolve. So far as I know,there has never been any accident or cause for alarm in the many refuels in flight so far carried out with the present tech-nique—would that the same could be said of refuels involving landing and taking off! For myself, I can only say that I would prefer what risksthere may be to flying up to 5,000 miles in an aircraft wholly dependent for its safety on its own tankage and on theunfailing operation of powered flying controls and gust-relief gadgetry. ^ G. HELLINGS. Aylesbury. STUDY THE PASSENGER But not by Speed Before Safety T7URTHER to Mr. G. D. Hart's reply to my letter whichJL appeared in the January 1 issue of Flight, I have read his observations with interest. I feel that no purpose is served by going into details, but Imost emphatically disagree with the passage: "In order to get • and hold foreign customers, B.O.A.C. will have to realize thatfrom the viewpoint of western hemisphere customers, speed comes before safety considerations." I should like to say thatsafety comes before any other consideration. What Mr- Hart, in fact, is saying is that it does not matterif you end up in the local cemetery provided you get there quickly.I think very few customers (and this includes Mrs. Boghouse) would agree with him.' _ W. VAN LEER.Welwyn Garden City. THE R.A.F.V.R. More Advanced Aircraft Types Wanted I WOULD like to answer your correspondent "474" (Febru-ary 19th) on one or two points he raised in connection with the post-war R.A.F.V.R. I quite agree with him that recruiting has fallen more thana little flat, but the reasons are quite simple. Before the war, schools were full of comparatively inexperi-enced pilots; nearly all had learnt to fly in the V.R. and few, if any, had flown advanced type aircraft. That is to say whatone has never had one never misses. Therefore, all were satisfied with the system of training and the planes they wereflying, and indeed the waiting list to enter the V.R. was so long that they felt they were rather lucky to be flying at all,and especially lucky that they were being paid to learn to fly. Things are rather different now. Only the experiencedex-R.A.F. pilots are at present allowed to join the Reserve; the majority of these pilots have flown advanced type aircraft,and have no wish to waste i their time fooling around with theV.R. They can fly elementary aircraft at their local Aero Club where they can take their wives and friends along, enjoydecent club facilities and escape all the rules, regulations and commitments of a military organization. If the R.A.F. desire to get these types back into the AirForce under the Volunteer Reserve, they must make it worth their while, giving them more advanced aircraft to fly, so thatthey can practise the latest radio and navigation procedure, and so that when the next war comes along they will only needan O.T.U. to be back on "ops" again. As it is at present, they will waste a considerable amount of time getting used tooperational aircraft after flying around in a Tiger Moth. Why not let the Reserve Schools have a few old Wellingtonsor Hurricanes? Failing that, even Oxfords or Harvards would help, then the Navigators and Wops would be able to flyalong with the pilots, and perhaps they would get a little crew training.Don't think that by all this I am under-rating the Tiger Moth; indeed it is an excellent aircraft, and I admit that tofly it accurately takes a considerable amount of skill, but why put your Lancaster or Dakota pilots into the air and tell themto do an hour's slow rolls and loops, when all the time they should be practising navigation and single-engine flying? To make the V.R. of the future into a going concern, splitthe school into two parts; one half of the school should revert to its peacetime practice of taking 18-year-old inexperiencedpupils and teach them to fly in the same way as the Uni- versity Air Squadrons are doing now. The other half to bemaintained by the O.T.LT. for the experienced aircrew l e[over from the last war. " EX-R.A.F." Loughborough. v .' w THE INFORMAL LIGHT AIRCRAFT COMMITTEE f Ignorance of Engineer's Duties Alleged _.. MARCUS LANG LEY'S diatribe (Flight, March 4th), upon*your correspondent's criticism of the report from the Informal Light Aircraft Committee, has only served to empha-size Mr. Andrews' original contention that the Committee's efforts must of necessity prove abortive on the grounds thatthey have been devoted to providing a report based inaccurate and misleading data. I feel perfectly confident in stating that Mr. Andrews'remarks upon relative salaries of ground and flying staff were in no way intended as a militant demand for increased financialremuneration for the maintenance engineer, but were merely advanced as an illustration of the abysmal ignorance of theengineer's duties that is, and has been for so long, extant among other sections of the industry. Furthermore, it followsthat if the Committee were so out of touch with current con- ditions in this particular instance, then one may be excused inassuming that it was likewise as uninformed upon other con- siderations. Mr. Langley says that the figures in question were '' tothe best of our knowledge, those ruling at the time." If this be so, would it not have been the obvious course to havereferred to an authority upon the subject, the Society of Licensed Aircraft Engineers, for confirmation. Turning to a more technical aspect, I, as a Licensed AircraftEngineer, have nothing but admiration for the Committee's laudable efforts toward reducing maintenance to the absoluteminimum, but I suggest that here again was a subject upon which the Society could have contributed invaluable evidencefrom its considerable reserve of practical experience and records. Maintenance of training aircraft, despite all the efforts of anenlightened design organization, is and must always remain peculiarly individual, and in an endeavour to minimize ser-vicing and repairs by increasing aircraft robustness, one must ensure that this line of development is not pursued to a degreewhere servicing and maintenance acquires discouraging propor- tions to the embryo pilot. -.-.. • • Far from registering surprise at Mr. Andrews' observations,I consider that the members of the Informal Light Aircraft Committee be advised to adopt a greater spirit of intelligentco-operation and of tolerance in the acceptance of differing opinions, in preference to indulging in the delivery of ill-advisedreprimands to their critics. D. W. RICHARDSON. Barnet, Herts. FORTHCOMING EVENTS ,J Mar. Mar. Mar. Mar. Mar. Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr.Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr. May 18th.—Royal Aeronautical Society : " Flight Testing at High Su sonic Speeds." H. Davies, B.A., M.Sc, A.F.R.Ae.S. 20th.—Society of Licensed Aircraft Engineers : " Brains Trust," in co-operation with the N.C.A. and A.R.B. Question Master, R. H. Hardingham, O.B.E. 22nd.—R.Ae.S. (Bristol) : " Operation of Civil Transport Aircraft." N. E. Rowe, C.B.E., F.R.Ae.S. 25th.—R.Ae.S. (Yeovil) : " Recent Development in Fb/ing-Boats." H. Knowler, F.R.Ae.S. -;• • V* 31st.—Royal United Service Institution : "Atomic Energy." Prof. H. S. W. Massey, F.R.S. 1st.—R.Ae.S. (Manchester) : " Flight Refuelling." C. H. Latimer Need ham. 1st.—R.Ae.S. (Yeovil) : A.G.M. and Films. 3rd.—Helicopter Association of Gt. Britain : " Probler.is in the Design of Multi-Rotor Helicopters." J. S. Shapiro, A.F.R.Ae.S. 3rd.—Rugby Football. R.A.F. versus Army, Twickenham. 5th.—R.Ae.S. (Derby) : " Flight Refuelling." Sir Alan Cobham, K.B.E., A.F.C. 7th.—R.Ae.S. (Gloucester and Cheltenham) : A.G.M. and Films. 7th.—R.Ae.S. (Luton) : " Rocket Propulsion and Interplanetary Flight," A. V. Cleaver, A.R.Ae.S. 14th.—R.Ae.S. (Graduates and Students) : " The Influence of the Recent Civil Airworthiness Requirements on Civil Aircraft Design." W. Tye, B.Sc, F.R.Ae.S. Mth.—R.Ae.S. (Bristol) : A.G.M. and Films. 15th.—Royal Aeronautical Society: "The Aerodynamic Problems of High Altitude Design." W. E. W. Petter, B.A., F.R.Ae.S. 16th.—British Interplanetary Society : " High Strength Hydrogen Peroxide for Rocket Propulsion." V. W. Slater, B.Sc., F.R.I.C, M.I.Chem.l., and W. S. Wood, B.Sc., F.R.I.C, A.M.I.Chem.E. 16th.—Institute of Navigation : " The Future of the Magnetic Compass." Cdr. W. E. May, R.N. 30th.—United Flying Clubs Ball, The Dorchester, Park Lane. 5th.—British Interplanetary Society : " Lunar Research." H. P. Wilkins, F.R.Ae.S.
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