The Waterbury Democrat., 1934-03-19

] SCOQLlnueO rom rage 1.J
 week or more. How soon the ser- vice might be returned to private operation was uncertain. If the army succeeds in restor- ing mail service without more casu- alties, 1t was believed the adminis- tration would not hurry to negoti- ate new private contracts. Mail routes resumed to-day were: Boston-New York; New York k-Jacksonville; New York-Chi- cago; Chicago Dallas; Chicago-San , Francisco; Salt Lake City-San Diego; Salt Lake City-Seattle and Cheyenne-Denver.
 Why They Failed San Antonio, Texas, March 19.- | (UP)-Lack of money with subse- quent curtailment of training and inefficient equipment is the story back of the effort of the army to | fly the mail, the concensus of air | corps veterans indicated to-day.
 The deaths of 10 young officers on the airmail job were of vital in- terest to this city-the Army's West Point of the air-for most of them received their training here. Veteran officers of the air corps are not talking for publication but they will point out facts and permit an observer to draw his | own conclusions.
 Points they make include: 1. Regular pilots restricted to four hours in the air a month and reserve pilots to thre ehours be. loa nf cIy nf fln 2. Single motored planes doing duty over hazardous unfamiliar routes where commercial lines use win-motored planes. 3. Officers sent out with the mail on night flights who received but 10 hours night flying in regu- lar training.
 4. Army men flying the mail | with less than 500 hours in the air, whereas commercial lines require l Ico-pilots to have approximately 1,- 900 hours and pilots from 4,O0O to i 5000 hours upwards. 5. Men trained in peace time, l fair-weather flying assigned to Q difficult job at time when wealth. CT conditions were terrible. Veterans of the army air service here are particularly interested in the controversy over the army's ef- | ficiency-or inefficiency-in the | air, and in Benjamin D. Foulois, now major general in charge Of l the air force. | It was 25 years ago that General Foulois brought the army's first airplane to what is now Kelly field. The plane cost $45,000 and was the only army plane in the world attn time.
 | Army's Air Center | Since then San Antonio has be-
 come the army's air center, with
 the $25,000 training station where
 army's air cadets are received and
 trained. Approximately 15S young
 men enter the training station
 every four months for their years
 work, but only 46 per cent finish
 the eight months of primary work
 at Randolph field which precedes
 their transfer to Kelly field for an-
 other four months of specialized work.
 At Randolph the recruits get
 about 157 hours in the air, includ-
 ing 10 hours of night flying. At
 Kelly they get 125 more hours in
 four types of planes. Then they
 are placed in the regular air
 squadrons, ready, theoretically. for
 any duty. Lack of funds now lim-
 it's their squadron flying to four
 hours a month.
 Commercial pilots on the im-
 portant lines average about 66
 hours month.
 The final test for all is a para
 chute jump.
 | It was from such a class that
 Colonel Charles A. Lindbergh was
 graduated in 1925. with the coveted Iwings of second lieutenant in the reserve corps.