Test Pilot Part 16

It's not in their blood. But occasionally you run across one who later gets going and is all right.

This guy came up to Southee for washout flight. He was so obviously broken up over the idea that he was going to get kicked out of the Air Service into some other branch of service, he loved flying so much, that Southee took pity on him, held him over a while, gave him special instruction, and finally got the guy through. The guy even became an instructor himself, and a very good one.

Later, most of the gang was transferred to Ellington Field, Houston, Tex. At Ellington, this guy had such a tough time at first, got so hot, that he was made a check pilot and put in charge of a stage or section.

One day one of the students came up to him for washout check. The kid was just as broken up about it as he was. He gave the kid a chance, like Southee had given him. Three days later the student froze on him, spun him in, and lulled him.

THE FIRST CRACK-UP

I sat in the c.o.c.kpit of an army DH, high over southern Texas. I was heading toward Kelly Field, the Army Advanced Flying School. I was returning from a student trip to Corpus Christi.

I was looking behind me. Beyond the tail of the ship I could see the Gulf of Mexico. Far out over the Gulf was a low string of white clouds.

The sky was very blue. The water flashed in the sun.

Occasionally I turned to scan my instrument board, but mostly I looked behind me. Purple distance slowly swallowed up the Gulf.

I turned around and faced forward and lit a cigarette. I looked at my instrument board. I looked at my map. The course line on my map lay between two railroads. I looked down at the earth. I was directly over a railroad, flying parallel to it. To my right a little distance ran another railroad, parallel to the one I was flying over. Another railroad lay off to my left. I could not decide which two of the three railroads I should be flying between.

I saw a little town on the railroad under me. I throttled back and nosed down. I circled low over the town and located the railroad station. I dove low past one end of the station and tried to read the name of the town on the station as I flashed past it. I didn't make it out. I opened the throttle to pull up. The engine started to pick up, then sputtered, then picked up all right. I paid no attention to its sputtering. It had done that when I took off from Kelly Field that morning. It had done it when I had circled the field at Corpus Christi on the Gulf. There was a dead spot in the carburetor. The engine was all right. It was airtight above or below that one spot on the throttle. I continued to pull up. I went around and dove low at the station again. Again I failed to read the sign. I opened the throttle to pull up. The engine started to pick up, then sputtered, then picked up beautifully. I went around and dove at the station again. I got it that time. It was Floresville, Tex. I knew where that was. I opened the throttle to pull up. The engine started to pick up, then sputtered, then died. The prop stood still.

I swung my ship to the left. I held it up as much as I dared. I headed toward the open s.p.a.ce. I was almost stalling. I barely cleared the last house. I was dropping rapidly. I eased forward on the stick. No response. I eased back. The nose dropped. I was stalled. I was about ten feet above the ground. There was a fence almost under me. Maybe I would clear it.

I heard a loud rending of wood and tearing of fabric. I felt a sensation of being pummeled and beaten. Something hit me in the face. Then I was aware of an immense quietness.

I just sat there in the c.o.c.kpit. The dust settled slowly in the still air. The hot Texas sun filtered through it. I still held the stick with my right hand. My left hand was on the throttle. My feet were braced on the rudder bar.

I was on a level with those fences. I stepped over the side of the c.o.c.kpit onto the ground. I looked at the wreck. The wings and landing gear were a complete Washout. The fuselage wasn't damaged.

I looked into the gasoline tanks. The main tank was empty. The reserve tank was full. I looked into the c.o.c.kpit at the gas valves. The main tank was turned on. The reserve tank was turned off. I turned the main tank off and turned the reserve tank on.

I phoned Kelly Field from a house near by.

An instructor flew down to get me. He landed his ship and then walked over and looked at my ship. He looked at the gas tanks. He looked in the c.o.c.kpit at the gas valves. He turned to me. His eyes twinkled.

"What was the matter, wouldn't your reserve tank take?" he asked.

"No, sir, it wouldn't take," I lied.

"That's the first tough luck you've had during the course, isn't it?" he asked.

"Yes," I said. "I have never cracked up before."

He flew me back to Kelly Field.

A POOR PROPHET

"What is the weather to New York?" I asked the weather man at the air-mail field at Bellefonte, Pa.

"Clear and unlimited all the way," he told me.

I took off in my low-wing Lockheed Sirius at dark and flew along the lighted beacons through the mountains. Half an hour later I ran into broken clouds at 4,000 feet. I flew under them. Soon they became solid and I couldn't see the stars overhead. I saw lightning ahead of me flashing in the darkness.

Water began to collect on my windshield. The air got very rough. A beacon light that had been flashing up ahead of me disappeared. I noticed the lights of a town beneath me getting dim. For a second I lost sight of them entirely. I nosed down to get out of the clouds.

A brilliant flash of lightning lit the darkness around me. I saw the rain driving in white sheets and caught the flash of a beacon through it. I nosed down toward the beacon and started circling it. I knew by my altimeter that I was down lower than some of the mountain ridges around me. I looked for the next beacon but couldn't see it through the raging thunderstorm. I didn't dare strike out in the general direction of the next beacon in the hope of finding it. I might hit a mountain top.

Another blinding flash of lightning surrounded me with glaring light. I saw the dark bottoms of the clouds and the black top of the next ridge I had to pa.s.s over. Then blackness and the slashing rain with only the friendly beacon under me.

I fought my way from beacon to beacon for an hour. The lightning flashes receded farther and farther behind me. I began to see from beacon to beacon. Stars appeared overhead. They were very dim. I was flying in a haze.

I pa.s.sed over Hadley Field, New Jersey, and saw its boundary lights burning cheerfully. I continued on toward Roosevelt Field. I was almost home now.

I noticed the lights of the towns beneath me getting dimmer. I looked up. The stars were gone. I looked down again. The lights had disappeared! I was flying blind in a thick fog. I began to fly by instruments. I pulled up. At 3,000 feet I saw the stars. I was on top of the fog.

I swung around to go back to Hadley Field. Its lights were covered. I saw the lights of what I figured was New Brunswick. I started circling them. I knew Hadley Field was only a few miles from there. The lights of New Brunswick began to blot out. Hey, what the h.e.l.l! I said out loud to myself.

I saw a segment of the rotating beam of a beacon break through a hole in the fog and make about a quarter of a turn in the darkness before it disappeared. That's the beam from Hadley beacon! I was saying all my thoughts out loud now. I flew over to where I figured the center of the beam was and started circling. The top of the fog looked pretty bright there. I decided that Hadley had heard me and had turned on its floodlights.

I eased back on my throttle, settled into a spiraling glide, and sank down into the fog, flying by instruments. The opaque white fog got more and more luminous. Individual bright spots, greatly blurred, began to appear. I figured they were the boundary lights of the field. My altimeter read very low. I broke through the bottom of the fog at about two hundred feet. I was over Hadley. I flew low into the blackness back of the field and came around and landed.

"What the h.e.l.l are you flying in this stuff for?" the Hadley weather man asked me.

"Because I was d.a.m.ned fool enough to take Bellefonte's weather report seriously," I said.

TOO MUCH KNOWLEDGE

When I was in Cleveland at the air races a couple of years ago four so-called flyers asked me to fly with them in their Bellanca to the Sky Harbor airport near Chicago. I agreed. We took off after the last race with just enough gas to make the field nicely. We hit a head wind, but I still figured we were okay. I didn't know where the field was, but one of the girls in the plane had been taking instruction at Sky Harbor and the other three claimed that they had lived in Chicago all their lives and knew Sky Harbor as well as their own mother.

When we got to Chicago it was already dark. I followed instructions. We flew north. Someone yelled I should turn east. I turned east. Someone else shouted that was all wrong, we were already too far east. I turned west. The next fifteen minutes were bedlam. "_East, north, west, and south,"_ they yelled. I lost my temper. "_Do you or do you not know where this field is?"_ I exploded. "_There it is!"_ they chorused. I heaved a sigh of relief and got ready to land. It wasn't the field. I looked at my gas, and my gas was too low. I took matters into my own hands and flew back to the munic.i.p.al airport and ga.s.sed up. We started out again. The situation started to strike me as funny as soon as the tanks were full. I let them have their fun, and eventually they did find the field. I called back to the girl who had been taking instruction and asked if there were any obstructions around the field. "Absolutely not!"

she vowed. I looked the field over as carefully as I could. There were no floodlights (they had also told me the field was well lighted). I cut the gun and glided in for a landing. A high-tension post whizzed by my left ear. We had missed the wires by just two inches. And there were no obstructions around the field!

HIDDEN FAULTS