Perth Amboy evening news., 1923-05-18

WASHINGTON, May t8:-From
New York to San Francisco in
twenty-eight hours!
In these days of setting up air
plane speed records one day only to
have them knocked into a cooked
hat the next, such a performance is
nothing to sit up nights and marvel
at. But as a regular schedule for
the transportation Of mail it is al
together a different matter. 1t is
n thing to make the single air
flight represented by that proposal,
for all the conditions entering into
such a test would be the most favor
able, but to undertake to make it
day in and day out, week in and
week out, as a feature of a routine
public service, is something else
again.
And yet that is exactly what the
Post Office Department is preparing
to undertake. Some time this sum
ner, in July or August, a continuous
aerial mail service between New
York and San Francisco will be es-
tablished. For more than a year
departmental officials have been
carefully planning this innovation,
and unless their plans &c all awry
AAAt udJ IL i1OI Idi Instant "IlEl lllE
Goddess of Liberty can mail a letter
at noon of one day and be assured
that it will be received by her sister
out Golden Gate way by the evening
of the next day.
This will be almost four times as
fast as the mails are now transported
by the fastest express trains. To be
exact, it will reduce the record for
train service by just ninety-six hours.
That, as the slangster would put it,
will be going some!
In the good old days of the stage
coach thirty days would have been
an amazingly short transit from New
York to San Francisco under the
most favorable conditions. In the
slightly better days of the pony ex-
press the scheduled time from St.
Joseph, Missouri, to the metropolis
of California was eight days. And
100 stations, with 400 horses and 80
riders were required to encompass
that! When transcontinental rail-
way transportation had developed
until it was all that seemed efficient,
a week was regarded as a record
breaking performance, from coast to
coast-as fast as anything could or
ought to travel-and then came the
four-day express. Now we are prom
ised the twenty-eight-hour air SER
vice, and who shall say that that will
be the last word in speed2
Record Night Flights
ITO accomplish this service air
mail pilots for the first time will fly
nearly 1000 miles, one-third of this
transcontinental marathon of the
air, in the dead of night" said Post
master General New, in making pub
lie the departments plans. These
flights, with the exception of the one
transatlantic exploit, will be the
longest sustained journeys by air
ever undertaken at night.
"Those who have directed the
work are confident that it will sue
coed. Beyond a doubt continuous
regular transcontinental air mail SER
vice will be a milestone in the his
tory of aviation and an epic in the
progress of transportation"
Leaving New York just before
midday the new air mail is sched-
uled to arrive in Chicago at sun
down. From the city by the lake,
start out in pursuit of the setting
sun. He will not overtake it, but
dawn will find him making his land
ing at Cheyenne, Wyoming, whence
another plane and another pilot will
wing over the rugged tops of the
Rockies and the Sierras, reaching
San Francisco before the sun agair
drops below the horizon. Once ac-
tually in operation the new service
will probably lop an hour or two of
the scheduled time of twenty-eight
hours for the whole trip.
During the night fight the pilot
will be guided and safeguarded ii
every possible way, according to the
officials. His route will be outlined
by a series of powerful electric
beacons, capable of piercing through
difficult atmospheric conditions anC
pointing the way unerringly to thu
terminal fields.
Each plane will be equipped will
searchlights which will be available
for forced landings in case of neces
sity. Emergency fields have beer
located and lighted every twenty-five
miles along the route. In addition
to these precautions the practicable
ity of the projected night flying /
of the terrain. The plains country
of the terrain. The plans country
noted for its levelness, fortunatel.
provides natural landing places