Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-09-24

of a battleship Admiral Twining gives
some interesting reasons why this would
be next to impossible. unless the airship
comes dangerously close to the battleship.
He said:
"A shot from a gun on a battleship
can reach the aeroplane much quicker
than a bomb can be dropped from the
airship to the battleshp. II gun could
be placed on an airship and fired down
ward the airship would then be In nearly
as good a position as the battleship. but
there has been no such gun yet invented
The question of weight comes In here.
\ gun to be of any value at all should
weigh about one hundred pounds and
when this weight is added to that of the
operator it would be too heavy for the
aeroplane to carry.
"A striking and simple illustration of
the difficulty an airman would experience
in dropping a bomb on the deck of
battleshp Is that Of a person going over
a trestle in railroad train travelling at
the rate of. say, thirty miles an hour try
ing to drop an orange between any two
ties of the treste In order to accom-
plish this feat 1t would be necessary to
drop the orange several seconds before
reaching the particular ties. because the
velocity of the train would throw the
orange ahead just so many feet. This is
the problem the airship is up against
when it attacks a battleship, only OH a
much greater scale.
Again. the weight an aeroplane can
carry is limited and very few bombs
could be carried by the airrnan, but on
the contrary a battleShip carries almost
any amount of ammunition, and 1t can
therefore afford to take more chances
than an arship. The same reasoning ap-
plies If a fleet Of airships should attempt
to destroy city.
I'VE hope ultimately to have such a
sight as will enable to fire at and
reach an aero at any point I'm the sky
within a vertical distance of at least 49,
600 feet or within a horizontal radius of
a mile And We believe that such a sight
will be designed shortly. When this IS
done there will be practically no danger
tn be apprehended from an airShip'
While the new gun can he fired from
any angle In a half circle it is the gen.
eral belief that it will never be aimed
at 80 degrees or in a perpendicular posi-
ton, for the reason that the shell might
return to the deck of the battleship prob
ably unexploded. and there work the de-
struction intended for the enemy The
angles of firing will probably range from
30 to 15 degrees.
When the gun was submitted to its
first test at Indian Head. Md. fifteen
shots were fired in the air at various
angles. then the gun was lowered to 10
degrees. but the firing crew lost sight of
the place where the shell fell because of
the experiments. The fuse of loaded
shell is so sensitive. ordnance experts
say, that explosion would result fmme-
diately upon contact with an airship even
though 1t grazed only wind and would
disable or demolsh the aeroplane and
probably kill the aviator.
The second days test was even more
favorable than the first day. A pre-
liminary examination of the new gun
showed it stood the first test without in
iury. The first shot was fired at an an
gle of about 20 degrees, and a long line
of smoke curving slightly az 1t reached
the heavens. furnished the commanding
Officer with his only clue as to the course