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Aviation History
1963
1963 - 1869.PDF
676 FLIGHT International, 24 October 1963 WORLD E W S Tokyo - London at 938 m.p.h. A General Dynamics B-58 Hustler bom ber of the US Air Force Strategic Air Command established several records on October 16 by flying non-stop from Tokyo to London in approximately 8£hr. The flight will, of course, rate for a new record between the two capitals, and it also is the longest known to have been made by an aircraft flying at an average speed greater than that of sound. The aircraft was B-58 A 61-2059 Can Do of 306 Bomb Wing from Bunker Hill AFB, Indiana. Its crew was Maj Sidney J. Kubesch (commander), Maj John O. Barrett (navigator) and Capt Gerard R. Williamson (defence-systems operator). Taking off from Okinawa, they crossed the timing "gate" over Tokyo at 0459hr GMT, cruising at up to 1,400 m.p.h. (Mach 2.12) and climbing from 49,000ft to about 57,000ft as fuel was consumed. Then came deceleration to below 600 m.p.h. at 30,000ft for a refuelling over Shemya, Aleutian Islands, by a KC-135. Further refuellings were made near Eielson AFB, Alaska; Thule, Greenland; Keflavik, Iceland; and Prestwick, Ayrshire. The let down to London was subsonic (sonic over pressures across the Arctic are permissible). The B-58 passed over the London "gate" at Hyde Park Corner at 1334 GMT and then landed at Greenham Common, Berks. The average speed of 938 m.p.h. for the 8,028 miles is just over twice the speed established in 1957 by an RAF Canberra, which took 17hr 42min on an approxi mately similar route flown in the reverse direction. Sipa STOL Project At their Suresnes factory Sipa are com pleting the construction of a STOL air craft with an "articulated wing." First trials are to be made in a wind-tunnel in the near future, preparatory to flight tests during the coming month. "Articulation" probably refers to incidence adjustment, but this is not confirmed. A. A. Griffith By the death of Dr A. A. Griffith, CBE, FRS—on October 11, at the age of 70—the science of aircraft propulsion has lost one of its greatest philosophers; but the fact is unlikely to be widely recognized, for if ever a brilliant engineer succeeded in eluding public acclaim it was Alan Arnold Griffith. Only in the inner circles of aeronautical science and industry was the true measure of his ability known. Since his retirement from the position of chief scientist of Rolls-Royce Ltd in 1960 he has continued as a consultant to the company, mainly on long-term projects. He had first joined them, from RAE Farn- borough, in 1939. Fresh from a Tate Science Scholarship at Liverpool University—where in 1914 he took his B.Eng with first-class honours—the young Griffith worked at Farnborough as a craftsman; but his true metier was soon recognized by a transfer to the physics laboratory, where he was chiefly engaged on research into engine design and materi als. An M.Eng and D.Eng were to follow in 1917 and 1921. Later, a wealth of distinctions and honours could have been his; but even his FRS in 1941, CBE in 1948 and RAeS Silver Medal in 1955 were accepted with characteristic diffidence. The achievement for which Griffith was most widely known—though "widely" is again a relative term in the context of public fame—was the development of vertical lift by jet thrust, as first revealed in the Rolls-Royce "Flying Bedstead" of the early nineteen-fifties. But his true masterpiece—only recognized as such in quite recent years, and never by the non technical Press and public—was a paper which he prepared at the RAE in 1926 under the title The Aerodynamic Theory of Turbine Design. In it (and this was two years before Frank Whittle, at the RAF College, produced his thesis on the centri fugal gas turbine) Griffith suggested that the gas turbine was feasible as a method of aircraft propulsion, and determined the basis for a complete design. But the exist ence of the paper remained obscure, and it was not until ten years later that the RAE obtained authority to build an axial- flow compressor following the recommenda tions of the paper. By 1938, following work by the RAE, Hayne Constant and Metro politan-Vickers, an experimental compres sor resembling that suggested by Griffith had been designed by the RAE, and was manufactured by Armstrong Siddeley in 1939; it was in fact the forerunner of the Python turboprop. Griffith was the true originator of the multi-stage axial engine. Australia's 100 Mirages The Australian Government announced last week that it had taken up its option to purchase a further 40 Dassault Mirage IIICs. This brings to 100 the total number of these aircraft ordered for the RAAF. Fred Korth Resigns President Kennedy accepted "with the utmost regret" the resignation of Mr Fred Korth, Secretary of the US Navy, on October 14. It is understood that the resig nation had more to do with the "cost, effectiveness" rejection of a second nuclear carrier rather than with the controversy which surrounded Mr Korth's role in the selection of GD/Grumman for the F-11 IB "TFX" aircraft for the US Navy. "Can Do" Did: The B-58 Hustler "Can Do" (see news story above) taxies in at Greenham Common, Berks, after its supersonic journey from Tokyo
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