The Washington times., 1919-05-21
FEAR WIRELESS
/. FAILED HAWKER
CONTINUED from First Page.)

reports were traced to baseless
sources and only stubborn unwilling
ness to admit the worst keeps alive
among the men who for many weeks
lived and worked with the Unlucky
pilot and navigator even the tiny
spark Of hope that they will yet De
heard from.
Recall HameTs Attempt.
To the minds of every one here has
come back vividly the recollection OF
Gustav Hamel and his attempt to fly
the English Channel in 1918. To this
day no one knows what happened to
Hamel, and the unspoken question
which one may read on every face OF
the airmen's group here is, will we
ever have the faintest inkling as to
Just what fate befeH Hawker AMI
Grieve once they disappeared into the
SKYE"
Every passing hour. with its failure
to bring authentic news. deepens the
fear that even the satisfaction Of ever
knowing what fate overlook them
will be denied forever to those whose
hearts were most closely set upon
the venture, as we'll as the families
waiting for news of them.
Comrades Knew the Danger.
1t is but an added tribute to their
hardihood to say now that what thus
far appears to be the fatal result OF
their venture was not unanticipated
here. No one who saw their single
engined machine. who examined their
frail lifeboat, and who considered
their scant means of navigation but
felt that, in Hawker's own favored
phrase, once they Jumped off deep
end" only phenomenal luck could
bring them through. The best that
many observers of their preparations
here hoped for them was that should
they be forced to plunge into the
sea some passing vessel would res
cue them.
Hawker himself, in an argument a
month ago with a correspondent who
had pictured the dangers Of his COM
ing fight, offered to make a large
bet leaving the money behind him.
that should he be forced to land in
the sea he would return safely to
Brooklands But in his boat were no
cars and no wireless-only few
mares and a tiny sea anchor which in
any current could not have held the
boat steady enough to enable vessel
sighting the distress flares at a dis
lance to find the drifters.
Fear Wireless Burned Ont.
In all probability, the most ominous
feature of the uncertainty of the two
AdLC 4lGS IN lue utter SllGuCC
which seems to have enyeloped them
ever since their biplane headed north
ward for the open sea. This silence
forces the minds Of the anxious here
TO dwell upon the mishap which befell
the first wireless gear installed in the
Airplane. This burned out few days
before the pair attempted a "hop Off
:; April IL, and they abandoned the at
tempt because they could not get
ready at the time they intended to de-
part without sending for apparatus,
- but the long delay on account OF I'M
favorable weather enabled them to
get new apparatus from abroad.
Thus they departed with their send
ing means successfully tested for
1oo-miIe radius, but the inevitable
question arises: Did the generator
burn out again, and thus were they
hopelessly silenced, perhaps at the
very moment they attempted to send
out the first distress message? II not
this, what?
Heading northward to escape local
adverse winds, did they get hopeless
" lost above the trackIess waters so
unfrequented by vessels at this sea-
son Of the year that, though Grieve
may have sent the Sopwith's call into
the ether. no answer came back, be-
cause the wireless waves died away
without reaching any one who might
have succored them?
Big Shift In Air Currents.
This makes pertinent much that has
been learned Of the drifting difficult
ties encountered in upper attitudes
during the United States navy sea-
planes flights to Halifax and New
foundland. Commander J. H. Tow
ers, who headed that expedition,
found on one occasion that the wind
currents shifted so rapidly that with
IN five minutes his plane, despite the
momentum Of four engines. reflected
a full thirty degrees from its course.
Lieutenant Commander BeIlinger, navi-
eating the CN-1 on the same leg,
found a change from five degrees
right TO thirty right within twenty
minutes.
These currents hampered the sea
planes, despite their elaborate charts
and specially constructed instru-
ments which help them to keep the
course. II they were encountered,
what must they have meant to Grieve.
depending on an ordinary compass
and ships sextant to guide him to
what in reality was a tiny objective,
considering the possibilities of fly
ing wide Of it?
My ne At BOTTOM OF Sea
A third possibility pondered in the
early morning hours, when in the
sitting room Of the Cochrane House a
hollow-eyed group gathered, recall
ing to the mind the gatherings one
has seen about the bulletin boards in
the Grand Central Station in New
York just after a week out of town.
was that Of mechanical failure, re-
sulting in a swift plunge into the
sea, with the possibility Of both men
being buried under the machine at
the bottom and never once rising to
the surface.
There can be little question that the
long delay here, the disappointment
over the almost impossible air condi-
tions, and the daily experience with
the distressing spring weather in this
part OF Newfoundland had been a Sc
we're ordeal for Hawker Worst of
all, perhaps, were the intermittent
days of getting 'all set" for the per-
iIous trip. even to donning part Of the
flying clothes, packing sandwiches,
and slowing away hot coffee, only TO
be forced just at the moment when all
were keyed for the jump to abandon
the plan because of bad weather and
sink back into the long slump Of
comparative lethargy