The Mastery of the Air Part 13

No; Pegoud's thrilling performance must be looked at from an entirely different standpoint to such feats of daring as the placing of one's head in the jaws of a lion, the traversing of Niagara Falls by means of a tight-rope stretched across them, and other similar senseless acts, which are utterly useless to mankind.

Let us see what such a celebrated airman as Mr. Gustav Hamel said of the pioneer of upside-down flying.

"His looping the loop, his upside-down flights, his general acrobatic feats in the air are all of the utmost value to pilots throughout the world. We shall have proof of this, I am sure, in the near future.

Pegoud has shown us what it is possible to do with a modern machine.

In his first attempt to fly upside down he courted death. Like all pioneers, he was taking liberties with the unknown elements. No man before him had attempted the feat. It is true that men have been upside down in the air; but they were turned over by sudden gusts of wind, and in most cases were killed. Pegoud is all the time rehearsing accidents and showing how easy it is for a pilot to recover equilibrium providing he remains perfectly calm and clear-headed. Any one of his extraordinary positions might be brought about by adverse elements. It is quite conceivable that a sudden gust of wind might turn the machine completely over. Hitherto any pilot in such circ.u.mstances would give himself up for lost. Pegoud has taught us what to do in such a case.... his flights have given us all a new confidence.

"In a gale the machine might be upset at many different angles.

Pegoud has shown us that it is easily possible to recover from such predicaments. He has dealt with nearly every kind of awkward position into which one might be driven in a gale of wind, or in a flight over mountains where air-currents prevail.

"He has thus gained evidence which will be of the utmost value to present and future pilots, and prove a factor of signal importance in the preservation of life in the air."

Such words as these, coming from a man of Mr. Hamel's reputation as an aviator, clearly show us that M. Pegoud has a life-saving mission for airmen throughout the world.

Let us stand, in imagination, with the enormous crowd of spectators who invaded the Surrey aerodrome on 25th September, and the two following days, in 1913.

What an enormous crowd it was! A line of motor-cars bordered the track for half a mile, and many of the spectators were busy city men who had taken a hasty lunch and rushed off down to Weybridge to see a little French airman risk his life in the air. Thousands of foot pa.s.sengers toiled along the dusty road from the paddock to the hangars, and thousands more, who did not care to pay the shilling entrance fee, stood closely packed on the high ground outside the aerodrome.

Biplanes and monoplanes came driving through the air from Hendon, and airmen of world-wide fame, such as Sopwith, Hamel, Verrier, and Hucks, had gathered together as disciples of the great life-saving missionary.

Stern critics these! Men who would ruthlessly expose any "faked"

performance if need were!

And where is the little airman while all this crowd is gathering? Is he very excited? He has never before been in England. We wonder if his amazing coolness and admirable control over his nerves will desert him among strange surroundings.

Probably Pegoud was the coolest man in all that vast crowd. He seemed to want to hide himself from public gaze. Most of his time, was taken up in signing post-cards for people who had been fortunate enough to discover him in a little restaurant near which his shed was situated.

At last his Bleriot monoplane was wheeled out, and he was strapped, or harnessed, into his seat. "Was the machine a 'freak' monoplane?" we wondered.

We were soon a.s.sured that such was not the case. Indeed, as Pegoud himself says: "I have used a standard type of monoplane on purpose.

Almost every aeroplane, if it is properly balanced, has just as good a chance as mine, and I lay particular stress on the fact that there is nothing extraordinary about my machine, so that no one can say my achievements are in any way faked."

During the preliminary operations his patron, M. Bleriot, stood beside the machine, and chatted affably with the aviator. At last the signal was given for his ascent, and in a few moments Pegoud was climbing with the nose of his machine tilted high in the air. For about a quarter of an hour he flew round in ever-widening circles, rising very quietly and steadily until he had reached an alt.i.tude of about 4000 feet. A deep silence seemed to have settled on the vast crowd nearly a mile below, and the musical droning of his engine could be plainly heard.

Then his movements began to be eccentric. First, he gave a wonderful exhibition of banking at right angles. Then, after about ten minutes, he shut off his engine, pitched downwards and gracefully righted himself again.

At last the amazing feat began. His left wing was raised, his right wing dipped, and the nose of the machine dived steeply, and turned right round with the airman hanging head downwards, and the wheels of the monoplane uppermost. In this way he travelled for about a hundred yards, and then slowly righted the machine, until it a.s.sumed its normal position, with the engine again running. Twice more the performance was repeated, so that he travelled from one side of the aerodrome to the other--a distance of about a mile and a half.

Next he descended from 4000 feet to about 1200 feet in four gigantic loops, and, as one writer said: "He was doing exactly what the clown in the pantomime does when he climbs to the top of a staircase and rolls deliberately over and over until he reaches the ground. But this funny man stopped before he reached the ground, and took his last flight as gracefully as a Columbine with outspread skirts."

Time after time Pegoud made a series of S-shaped dives, somersaults, and spiral descents, until, after an exhibition which thrilled quite 50,000 people, he planed gently to Earth.

Hitherto Pegoud's somersaults have been made by turning over from front to back, but the daring aviator, and others who followed him, afterwards turned over from right to left or from left to right. Pegoud claimed to have demonstrated that the aeroplane is uncapsizeable, and that if a parachute be attached to the fuselage, which is the equivalent of a life boat on board a ship, then every pilot should feel as safe in a heavier-than-air machine as in a motor-car.

CHAPTER XLIV. The First Englishman to Fly Upside Down

After M. Pegoud's exhibition of upside-down flying in this country it was only to be expected that British aviators would emulate his daring feat. Indeed, on the same day that the little Frenchman was turning somersaults in the air at Brooklands Mr. Hamel was asking M. Bleriot for a machine similar to that used by Pegoud, so that he might demonstrate to airmen the stability of the aeroplane in almost all conceivable positions.

However, it was not the daring and skilful Hamel who had the honour of first following in Pegoud's footsteps, but another celebrated pilot, Mr.

Hucks.

Mr. Hucks was an interested spectator at Brooklands when Pegoud flew there in September, and he felt that, given similar conditions, there was no reason why he should not repeat Pegoud's performance. He therefore talked the matter over with M. Bleriot, and began practising for his great ordeal.

His first feat was to hang upside-down in a chair supported by a beam in one of the sheds, so that he would gradually become accustomed to the novel position. For a time this was not at all easy. Have you ever tried to stand on your hands with your feet upwards for any length of time?

To realize the difficulty of being head downwards, just do this, and get someone to hold your legs. The blood will, of course, "rush to the head", as we say, and the congestion of the blood-vessels in this part of the body will make you feel extremely dizzy. Such an occurrence would be fatal in an aeroplane nearly a mile high in the air at a time when one requires an especially clear brain to manipulate the various controls.

But, strange to say, the airman gradually became used to the "heels-over-head" position, and, feeling sure of himself, he determined to start on his perilous undertaking. No one with the exception of M. Bleriot and the mechanics were present at the Buc aerodrome, near Versailles, when Mr. Hucks had his monoplane brought out with the intention of looping the loop.

He quickly rose to a height of 1500 feet, and then, slowly dipping the nose of his machine, turned right over. For fully half a minute he flew underneath the monoplane, and then gradually brought it round to the normal position.

In the afternoon he continued his experiments, but this time at a height of nearly 3000 feet. At this alt.i.tude he was flying quite steadily, when suddenly he a.s.sumed a perpendicular position, and made a dive of about 600 feet. The horrified spectators thought that the gallant aviator had lost control of his machine and was dashing straight to Earth, but quickly he changed his direction and slowly planed upwards. Then almost as suddenly he turned a complete somersault. Righting the aeroplane, he rose in a succession of spiral flights to a height of between 3000 and 3500 feet, and then looped the loop twice in quick succession.

On coming to earth M. Bleriot heartily congratulated the brave Englishman. Mr. Hucks admitted a little nervousness before looping the loop; but, as he remarked: "Once I started to go round my nervousness vanished, and then I knew I was coming out on top. It is all a question of keeping control of your nerves, and Pegoud deserved all the credit, for he was the first to risk his life in flying head downwards."

Mr. Hucks intended to be the first Englishman to fly upside down in England, but he was forestalled by one of our youngest airmen, Mr.

George Lee Temple. On account of his youth--Mr. Temple was only twenty-one at the time when he first flew upside-down--he was known as the "baby airman", but there was probably no more plucky airman in the world.

There were special difficulties which Mr. Temple had to overcome that did not exist in the experiments of M. Pegoud or Mr. Hucks. To start with, his machine--a 50-horse-power Bleriot monoplane--was said by the makers to be unsuitable for the performance. Then he could get no a.s.sistance from the big aeroplane firms, who sought to dissuade him from his hazardous undertaking. Experienced aviators wisely shook their heads and told the "baby airman" that he should have more practice before he took such a risk.

But notwithstanding this lack of encouragement he practised hard for a few days by hanging in an inverted position. Meanwhile his mechanics were working night and day in strengthening the wings of the monoplane, and fitting it with a slightly larger elevator.

On 24th November, 1913, he decided to "try his luck" at the London aerodrome. He was harnessed into his seat, and, bidding his friends farewell, with the words "wish me luck", he went aloft. For nearly half an hour he climbed upward, and swooped over the aerodrome in wide circles, while his friends far below were watching every action of his machine.

Suddenly an alarming incident occurred. When about a mile high in the air the machine tipped downwards and rushed towards Earth at terrific speed. Then the tail of the machine came up, and the "baby airman" was hanging head downwards.

But at this point the group of airmen standing in the aerodrome were filled with alarm, for it was quite evident to their experienced eyes that the monoplane was not under proper control. Indeed, it was actually side-slipping, and a terrible disaster appeared imminent. For hundreds of feet the young pilot, still hanging head downwards, was crashing to Earth, but when down to about 1200 feet from the ground the machine gradually came round, and Mr. Temple descended safely to Earth.

The airman afterwards told his friends that for several seconds he could not get the machine to answer the controls, and for a time he was falling at a speed of 100 miles an hour. In ordinary circ.u.mstances he thought that a dive of 500 feet after the upside-down stretch should get him the right way up, but it really took him nearly 1500 feet.

Fortunately, however, he commenced the dive at a great alt.i.tude, and so the distance side-slipped did not much matter.

It is sad to relate that Mr. Temple lost his life in January, 1914, while flying at Hendon in a treacherous wind. The actual cause of the accident was never clearly understood. He had not fully recovered from an attack of influenza, and it was thought that he fainted and fell over the control lever while descending near one of the pylons, when the machine "turned turtle", and the pilot's neck was broken.

CHAPTER XLV. Accidents and their Cause

"Another airman killed!" "There'll soon be none of those flying fellows left!" "Far too risky a game!" "Ought to be stopped by law!"

How many times have we heard these, and similar remarks, when the newspapers relate the account of some fatality in the air! People have come to think that flying is a terribly risky occupation, and that if one wishes to put an end to one's life one has only to go up in a flying machine. For the last twenty years some of our great writers have prophesied that the conquest of the air would be as costly in human life as was that of the sea, but their prophecies have most certainly been wrong, for in the wreck of one single vessel, such as that of the t.i.tanic, more lives were lost than in all the disasters to any form of aerial craft.

Perhaps some of our grandfathers can remember the dread with which many nervous people entered, or saw their friends enter, a train. Travellers by the railway eighty or ninety years ago considered that they took their lives in their hands, so to speak, when they went on a long journey, and a great sigh of relief arose in the members of their families when the news came that the journey was safely ended. In George Stephenson's days there was considerable opposition to the inst.i.tution of the railway, simply on account of the number of accidents which it was antic.i.p.ated would take place.

Now we laugh at the fears of our great-grandparents; is it not probable that our grandchildren will laugh in a similar manner at our timidity over the aeroplane?

In the case of all recent new inventions in methods of locomotion there has always been a feeling among certain people that the law ought to prohibit such inventions from being put into practice.

There used to be bitter opposition to the motor-car, and at first every mechanically-driven vehicle had to have a man walking in front with a red flag.