The Washington herald., 1911-07-11
ATWOOD RELATES
STORY OF FLIGHT
Aviator Suffers from Heat
in Record Journey.

Baltimore, July 10.-Harry Atwood.
the Boston aviator, accompanied y
Charley Hamilton, in the latter's OIL
plane. to-day made a record flight from
Atlantic City to SIemmers Run, a point
on the Philadelphia, Baltimore and
Washington Railroad about nine miles
east of this city. It established a new
record for a distance ce-with-passenger
flight, and broke all records for endur-
ance against intense heat and humidity.
When forced down by the humidity and
heavy atmosphere the men were we'll
nigh exhausted They expect to resume
their fight TO the National Capital
early tomorrow morning.
Here is Atwood's story OF his fight
from Atlantic City:
We could have kept right on the
Washington without a break had 1t not
been for lack OF buoyancy in the air,
due to the heat. Phewl but IT was hot
We would have landed in a field just
outside of Baltimore, anyway, but 1t
would have been nearer the city. In
such heat It would have been danger
GUS and foolhardy TO fly over the city.
There was no life to that intensely
heated air. 1t was warmer high in the
air than below on the earth. We landed
where we did because we were too ex-
hausted from heat to go on much farther.
Repair Broken Planes.
I'VE worked nearly all last night re-
pairing HamiIton's machine with pieces Of
the one smashed in the surf. We started
at exactly 500 o'clock. All along the
road people were out to watch us as we
sailed over towns. The flight over Jersey
was like cutting torrid wave.
THE air was close and heavy. Cold
air is much more buoyant than hot air,
as salt water is more buoyant than
fresh water. When the thermometer got
up in the nineties I simply couldn't get
the machine to go up any. Hence. nat
uraIIy came down. But 1t was a beutI-
ful ride and I enjoyed It.
I'VE travelled 14S miles. the Ameri-
can record for passenger-carrying, my
previous record being 135 miles, from
Boston to New London, via Cape Cod.
The Paragraph showed the highest alti-
tude reached was LOO feet, just outside
Atlantic City. The time was hours 80
minutes. This. with the stop outside
Wilmington, Del, and one place when
the machine went only three miles an
hour for twenty minutes, because of the
heaviness of the atmosphere, makes the
actual time less than four hours.
'It was the hottest flight have ever
made. Our altitude was about 80 seet
as we sailed over the east end of VIII
mington. We did not notice any car
hureter trouble until we got well out Of
Wilmington. From that point we never
Few more than 800 feet high
Sometimes We barely got over the
trees. 1t was the hardest Job I've ever
tackled, keeping that machine in the air.
Even the best automobile motors have
trouble this kind of weather. Toward
the last we got down to as little as
twenty-five feet over the tree tops.
Barely Miss Tree Tops.
"At some points we had TO leave the
railroad tracks for fear of hitting the
telegraph poles or landing on the rails
At other points we got so low that We
had to squeeze in between the trees, and
at one place we had to circle clump of
trees and come all the way around them
to get enough elevation just to crawl
over. At one little village about twenty
miles from Baltimore we missed the top
Of a house by eighteen feet.
"It was fine sight for the people on
the ground. They did not have the least
trouble seeing us. They could have
touched US with step ladders on the roofs
"As we passed overNNewport, a sta
tion on the Pennsylvania Railroad this
side OF Wilmington, an express train
came along. We beat that train to Elk
~, so,,r ,,,,rufae toft, train ~
plane going at good speed"