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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 0377.PDF
25 March 1955 377 SPORTSMEN ALL: At the Royal Aero Club dinner to King's Cup winners between 1923 and 1954 (a report appears below) are: (Top, left to right) Sir Alan Cobham, "Freddy" Rowarth, Mrs. Adams (formerly Miss Winifred Brown), Maj. R. H. Mayo and Lord Brabazon. In the second group are Walter Bowles, "Nat" Somers and E. H. W. Lucas. patronage, a 450 h.p. Napier Lion had been "stuck into" a D.H.9for the race of 1923 and how that venerable aeroplane had thereby been dragged through the air at 160 m.p.h. Sir Alan's account ofthe race held the assembly enthralled by its graphic spontaneity. Tommy Rose recalled that he had more fun baiting the handi-cappers than in the race itself—though one had to be careful not to overdo that pastime for fear that a decimal point might bemoved in retaliation. Freddy Rowarth—past-master of handi- capping—said that he would never forgive "Wally" Hope, for hewas the only man ever to do the handicappers down. He remem- bered a telegram being received in his house from Tommy Rose, reading: "Freddy, you old , what do you think I am flying, an S.6?" Maj. Mayo, chairman of the racing committee, paid tribute tohis great personal friend Capt. F. L. Barnard, three times winner, who had been killed testing the Bristol Badminton forthe race of 1927. Bristol Executive Appointment Mr. W. U. Snell, M.I.Mech.E., M.I.P.E., A.F.R.Ae.S., has been appointed executive assistant to A. Cdre. F. R. Banks, a director of the Bristol Aeroplane Co., Ltd. Originally in the motor industry, Mr. Snell came into aircraft in 1934, being successively with Pobjoy Airmotors and the de Havilland engine and propeller companies. He joined Bristoh in 1947 and has been chief execu- tive of the engineering depart- ment of the engine division for the past tour years. Ford Hunter Accident Verdicts A T the resumed inquest at Chichester last week on a Naval•'*• chief petty officer, his wife, and a petty officer, all three of whom lost their lives when a Hawker Hunter struck caravansnear the perimeter of the airfield at Ford on January 25th, verdicts of death by misadventure were returned in each case. TheCoroner said that there was no evidence whatever on which to assume negligence, adding that the jury would agree that the pilotof the Hunter—Air. Frank Murphy, Hawker's chief production test pilot—"behaved in the very best traditions of his profession." Giving evidence, Mr. Murphy—who received injuries in thecrash—said that his engine stopped, and would not restart, when tie was 45,000 ft above the South Coast. He established radiocontact with Ford and dived down to attempt a landing. "I attempted to lower the emergency flaps," said Mr. Murphy,"but was unable to do so, which meant that, lacking braking power, I had to land by diving on to the ground at the beginningof the aerodrome in the hope that I would stop within the length." The aircraft had touched down and proceeded across the air-field in a series of bumps (here the coroner interposed that photo- graphs taken afterwards showed that the Hunter had touched theground 19 times). Mr. Murphy added that the machine had run °ff the airfield, veered left and continued in a straight line, thoughgoing sideways. "Vibration was very intense," he said, "and I could not see anything." The flaps came down just before he touched down; it was reasonable to think that had they not failedhe would have been able to stop within the aerodrome. He tried to land with his wheels up to act as a brake.Mr. D. Cameron-Douglas, senior investigating officer of the M.T.C.A. Accident Branch, said that examination of the wreck-age showed that the flaps had operated; with due respect to Mr. Murphy he might not have operated the release in the firstinstance. Examination of the engine had shown that the fuel system and igniter plugs were in order but a broken wire hadbeen found in the circuit of the relighting system; he was practic- ally positive that the breakage had occurred during flight. U.S. Trans-continental Record '"THREE fighters of the U.S.A.F. succeeded in breaking the Los*• Angeles-New York speed record on March 10th by covering the 2,445 miles in less than four hours. Eight machines set out,but five failed to arrive at New York. The fastest of those success- ful, a Republic F-84F Thunderstreak piloted by Lt-Col. RobertScott, averaged 649 m.p.h., cutting 19 min 43 sec off the January 1954 record (4 hr 8 min 5 sec, 615 m.p.h.) by Col. W. K. Millikanin an F-86F Sabre. On landing, Col. Scott commented that the times would have been better had the aircraft not had to "slowdown almost to stall" to refuel from "the obsolete old tankers." Col. Scott failed to break the U.S. Navy's San Diego-New Yorktrans-continental record (seven miles shorter than the Los Angeles- New York course) set up in April last year by Lt-Cdr. FrancisBady, who flew a Grumman F9F Cougar between those points in 3 hr 45 min 30 sec. Aviation Art AT the recent inaugural meeting of the Society of AviationL Artists the following were elected painter-members: George Ay'ing; Laurence C. Bagley; Frank E. Beresford; Leonard Bridg-nan, F.R.Ae.S.; A. Egerton Cooper; Roy Cross; Charles Cundall, R.A.; Terence Cuneo, G. H. Davis; Geoffrey Draper; W. HowardJarvis; Kenneth McDonough; Edward Newling; Roy Nockolds; Cuthbert Orde; Keith Shackleton; David R. Shepherd; Charles E.Turner; Norman Wilkinson, C.B.E., P.R.I., R.O.I.; Leslie A. Wilcox, R.I.; Frank A. A. Wootton; Colonel Harold Wyllie,O.B.E.; Miss Pamela Drew. Officers were appointed as follows: President, Norman Wilkin-son; vice-president, Frank Wootton; hon. secretary, Roy Nockolds; hon. treasurer, Leonard Bridgman. The annual exhibition is to be held in London next September.
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