The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1920-02-24
MAKING I Travel
BY AIR SAFE
Wireless Telephone Will Do Much
to Insure Speedy Mail
Deliveries.
British EXPERTS At WORK
when New System 10 Working Prop.
eriy Pilots viii Be In Constant
Touch With Ground by Means
OF Wireless.

London.-Will the aerial mail serv'
ice. when its organization has been
improved, still continue to be inter-
Eupted by such adverse weather as
during the past week prevented on
several days the flying Of tho mall
machines between London and PARISH
Asked this question the other day by
q representative Of the London Times,
Holt Thomas, whose high speed b.
planes carry the London.Paris mail.
replied with an emphatic mo-"
At present, he explained, we are
flying daily over what is, to q large
extent, still an unorganized route; and
It is no exaggeration at all to say that
when all the organization which We
are busily preparing is brought &C.
tually into play, as it will be before
We have to encounter another winter.
such conditions as prevented Lieuten-
ant McMullin from getting through
to Paris on the first day Of the air
mail last Monday will have no ad-
verse effect at all on the flying Of
machine, either from the point Of view
Of safety or Of adhering to scheduled
time.
Wireless telegraphy will help us
enormously and We have now tho
services Of one Of the most practical
experts in this country, who is con-
centrating his attention exclusively on
the question as to how directional
wireless and the wireless telephone
may be made to help US in regular
daily flying and to overcome such
difficulties as at present cause delay.
Information for Plane Pilot.
When we have this system working
properly it will mean that during our
hours Of flying, say from II o'clock to
4 p. NJ, every land operator will be
listening for messages from the air
and q pilot having set out say from
Hounslow. and wishing to know ex-
actly what the weather is like In the
channel, will simply take up his re-
ceiver and call "Hello, Lympne." All
the other stations on the airway will
hear, but only Lympne will reply. and
in moment the pilot will be given
the information he requires. 1t will
also be quite easy for one pilot to
speak to another while two machines
are in flight.
In each machine. also. we shall
place light telescope mast. This
will be jointed and will lie in the
fuselage without taking UP any room.
But should pilot have to make n
compulsory descent he will on alight-
ing take out his mast. joint it together
and place the aerial" of his wire
less telephone on the top Of it. Then,
when he has raised this mast and
stuck the end of 1t In the ground
it will be about 80 feet high when
fully extended-he will be able to call
up the nearest acrodrome on his wire.
less telephone and tell them just what
field he is down in and what his
trouble is. In such a case, if man
cannot ascend again quickly, we shall
send another machine to him from the
nearest relief point. which will take
on his mails. We shall soon have a
French sections Of the route. whereby
a pilot who has forced landing can
get into touch Immediately with the
nearest land agent Of the service, who
will take over his mails Mt once and
send them on their way in fast mo-
torcycle. :
The point Is now demonstrated very
clearly that with skillful pilot and
fast machine the only sort Of at
mosphcric conditions which seriously
Interrupts flying is such as we en-
counter sometimes on bad November
day, when an Opaque mist, beginning
almost at ground level. may extend
upward in an unbrOken mass, to an
altitude of something like 10000 feet.
Hurting Through the Fog.
A pilot in an afrplane. flying on
through n thick mist. Is as unhappy
rs a pedestrian in dense fog-only
more 50. Not only is there the ques-
tiOn OF finding his way. but he Is
faced also by the embarrassing fact
that, through not being able to turn
his eye upon any horizon line, he can
not Judge the altitude. or inclination
of his machine in relation to the
ground below, with the result that he
may get into side slip or spin and
find suddenly that his machine has
passed out Of his control-a condition
Of affairs which may spell extreme
peril.
Then we expect very soon to have
improved considerably the instru-
ments in a machine which tell its
pilot it's altitude and inclination when
he is deprived by fog or cloud of a
horizon line. Then. as vet another
point, we are working on the question
Of lighting aerodomes and landing
grounds so that pilot can make q
safe contact with the ground even
when the air is heavily obscured.
This is, of course, point Of capital
Importance. It is not enough to
guide q man accurately while he Is
a-sn~ - vnlc&v roofhor Won vnnsf