The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1919-07-25

ON account Of fog.
New York. July 25.-Uness Leon
Smith and Hamilton Lee, two former
aviators who have been operating air
planes on the New York to Washing
lton aerial mail route and who We're dis
charged because of their refusal to fly
in the fog last Tuesday, are reinstated
| this morning, the twenty aerial mail
pilots at Belmont Park declared they
will strike. The men protested to Sec
ond Assistant Postmaster General
Praeger on Wednesday, giving him
twenty-four hours to make known his
decision.
At O'Clock yesterday evening tele
gram from Washington stated that the
Post Office Department could not al
low the complaint. The pilots then
stated they would not take the ma
chimes out today.
In presenting their demands to Mr..
Praeger, the aerial letter carriers de-
clared that they are forced to risk
their lives for two-cent stamp in all
sorts and conditions of weather in ma
chimes which are unsafe.
Replying to the men, Mr.. Praeger
took occasion to warn them that they
were putting themselves in a posi-
tion of conspiring against the Gov
ernment. He pointed out that Smith
and Lee were not obliged to fly. but
that they had to either fly or quit. The
order of the Post Office Department
would have to be obeyed, he said.
For some time, the men operating
the mail airplanes have been COM
planning against the way in which they
were ordered to fly in any weather and
in machines which tDey considered un-
safe. All of them have been in the
army. and they are unanimous in as
serting that never in their army days
did they have to go up in fog and
storms as these in which they have
carried the mail during the past two
weeks. The machines, they say, are
too heavy, too fast, and have engines
of too high compression for the W ork.
A few days before Smith and Lee re-
fused to fly, the men at Belmont Park
say, two of the oldest and most ex-
perienced pilots in the service, Stevens
and Webster, had refused to fly in bad
weather. These men were only trans
ferred to another route, the pilots
say and charge that the decision to
discharge Smith and Lee is favortism.
According to the men, the mail
planes are ilk adapted to the work.
They are big machines, equipped with
400-horsepower Liberty motors, and
cannot go at a slower rate of speed
than 100 miles an hour. The angle
of visibility when the pilots look out
of the cockpit is only rs feet This
fact. the pilots say, necessitates their
flying close to earth. and when the
engines stall, as they are apt to when
running at high speed, there is hardly
a chance for the men in the machine
to make a safe landing.
They demand lighter and slower ma
chimes, with a wider range of visibility
They also say that they have repeat
edly asked for stabilizers fer their
machines to show whether they are
flying on an even keel or not when
they are in a fog. This request, it is
alleged, Mr.. Praeger refused, telling
the men to steer by compass. as the
turn indicators were too expensive.
II is also stated that since July Is
when the recent bad weather began,
and up to July % there were no fewer
than Is accidents. Two pilots, it is
stated, have been killed in the air.
These two, McCusker and Sanborn
went up in machines they told their
superiors were unsafe, but were sent
ahead anyhow. One of the machines
the fall of which resulted fatally, the
men say. had been repaired three
times, and was mo good at all"
Summing up their complaints the pi-
lots say that the discharge of Smith
and Lee without justification or inves-
tigation was an insult to expert pilots
in the service, inasmuch as these pilots
had the misfortune to be in a position
where they had to refuse to fly in or
der to save their own lives.