The Mastery of the Air Part 15

CHAPTER XLVIII. Some Technical Terms used by Aviators

Though this book cannot pretend to go deeply into the technical side of aviation, there are certain terms and expressions in everyday use by aviators that it is well to know and understand.

First, as to the machines themselves. You are now able to distinguish a monoplane from a biplane, and you have been told the difference between a TRACTOR biplane and a PROPELLER biplane. In the former type the screw is in front of the pilot; in the latter it is to the rear of the pilot's seat.

Reference has been previously made to the FUSELAGE, SKIDS, AILERONS, WARPING CONTROLS, ELEVATING PLANES, and RUDDER of the various forms of air-craft. We have also spoken of the GLIDING ANGLE of a machine.

Frequently a pilot makes his machine dive at a much steeper gradient than is given by its natural gliding angle. When the fall is about one in six the glide is known as a VOL PLANE; if the descent is made almost vertically it is called a VOL PIQUE.

In some cases a PANCAKE descent is made. This is caused by such a decrease of speed that the aeroplane, though still moving forward, begins to drop downwards. When the pilot finds that this is taking place, he points the nose of his machine at a much steeper angle, and so reaches his normal flying speed, and is able to effect a safe landing.

If he were too near the earth he would not be able to make this sharp dive, and the probability is that the aeroplane would come down flat, with the possibility of a damaged cha.s.sis. It is considered faulty piloting to make a pancake descent where there is ample landing s.p.a.ce; in certain restricted areas, however, it is quite necessary to land in this way.

A far more dangerous occurrence is the SIDE-SLIP. Watch a pilot vol-planing to earth from a great height with his engine shut off. The propeller rotates in an irregular manner, sometimes stopping altogether.

When this happens, the skilful pilot forces the nose of his machine down, and so regains his normal flying speed; but if he allowed the propeller to stop and at the same time his forward speed through the air to be considerably diminished, his machine would probably slip sideways through the air and crash to earth. In many cases side-slips have taken place at aerodromes when the pilot has been rounding a pylon with the nose of his machine pointing upwards.

When a machine flies round a corner very quickly the pilot tilts it to one side. Such action as this is known as BANKING. This operation can be witnessed at any aerodrome when speed handicaps are taking place.

Since upside-down flying came into vogue we have heard a great deal about NOSE DIVING. This is a headlong dive towards earth with the nose of the machine pointing vertically downwards. As a rule the pilot makes a sharp nose dive before he loops the loop.

Sometimes an aeroplane enters a tract of air where there seems to be no supporting power for the planes; in short, there appears to be, as it were, a HOLE in the air. Scientifically there is no such thing as a hole in the air, but airmen are more concerned with practice than with theory, and they have, for their own purposes, designated this curious phenomenon an AIR POCKET. In the early days of aviation, when machines were far less stable and pilots more quickly lost control of their craft, the air pocket was greatly dreaded, but nowadays little notice is taken of it.

A violent disturbance in the air is known as a REMOUS. This is somewhat similar to an eddy in a stream, and it has the effect of making the machine fly very unsteadily. Remous are probably caused by electrical disturbances of the atmosphere, which cause the air streams to meet and mingle, breaking up into filaments or banding rills of air. The wind--that is, air in motion--far from being of approximate uniformity, is, under most ordinary conditions, irregular almost beyond conception, and it is with such great irregularities in the force of the air streams that airmen have constantly to contend.

CHAPTER XLIX. The Future in the Air

Three years before the outbreak of the Great War, the Master-General of Ordnance, who was in charge of Aeronautics at the War Office, declared: "We are not yet convinced that either aeroplanes or air-ships will be of any utility in war".

After four years of war, with its ceaseless struggle between the Allies and the Central Powers for supremacy in the air, such a statement makes us rub our eyes as though we had been dreaming.

Seven years--and in its pa.s.sage the air encircling the globe has become one gigantic battle area, the British Isles have lost the age-long security which the seas gave them, and to regain the old proud una.s.sailable position must build a gigantic aerial fleet--as greatly superior to that of their neighbours as was, and is, the British Navy.

Seven years--and the monoplane is on the sc.r.a.p-heap; the Zeppelin has come as a giant destroyer--and gone, flying rather ridiculously before the onslaughts of its tiny foes. In a recent article the editor of The Aeroplane referred to the erstwhile terror of the air as follows: "The best of air-ships is at the mercy of a second-rate aeroplane". Enough to make Count Zeppelin turn in his grave!

To-day in aerial warfare the air-ship is relegated to the task of observer. As the "Blimp", the kite-balloon, the coast patrol, it scouts and takes copious notes; but it leaves the fighting to a tiny, heavier-than-air machine armed with a Lewis gun, and destructive attacks to those big bomb-droppers, the British Handley Page, the German Gotha, the Italian Morane tri-plane.

The war in the air has been fought with varying fortunes. But, looking back upon four years of war, we may say that, in spite of a slow start, we have managed to catch up our adversaries, and of late we have certainly dealt as hard knocks as we have received. A great spurt of aerial activity marked the opening of the year 1918. From all quarters of the globe came reports, moderate and almost bald in style, but between the lines of which the average man could read word-pictures of the skill, prowess, and ceaseless bravery of the men of the Royal Flying Corps and Royal Naval Air Service. Recently there have appeared two official publications (1), profusely ill.u.s.trated with photographs, which give an excellent idea of the work and training of members of the two corps. Forewords have been contributed respectively by Lord Hugh Cecil and Sir Eric Geddes, First Lord of the Admiralty. These publications lift a curtain upon not only the activities of the two Corps, but the tremendous organization now demanded by war in the air.

(1) The Work and Training of the Royal Flying Corps and The Work and Training of the Royal Naval Air Service.

All this to-day. To-morrow the Handley Page and Gotha may be occupying their respective niches in the museum of aerial antiquities, and we may be all agog over the aerial pa.s.senger service to the United States of America.

For truly, in the science of aviation a day is a generation, and three months an eon. When the coming of peace turns men's thoughts to the development of aeroplanes for commerce and pleasure voyages, no one can foretell what the future may bring forth.

At the time of writing, air attacks are still being directed upon London. But the enemy find it more and more difficult to penetrate the barrage. Sometimes a solitary machine gets through. Frequently the whole squadron of raiding aeroplanes is turned back at the coast.

As for the military advantage the Germans have derived, after nearly four years of attacks by air, it may be set down as practically nil.

In raid after raid they missed their so-called objectives and succeeded only in killing noncombatants. Far different were the aim and scope of the British air offensives into Germany and into country occupied by German troops. Railway junctions, ammunition dumps, enemy billets, submarine bases, aerodromes--these were the targets for our airmen, who scored hits by the simple but dangerous plan of flying so low that misses were almost out of the question.

"Make sure of your objective, even if you have to sit upon it." Thus is summed up, in popular parlance, the policy of the Royal Flying Corps and Royal Naval Air Service. And if justification were heeded of this strict limitation of aim, it will be found in the substantial military losses inflicted upon the enemy results which would never have been attained had our airmen dissipated their energies on non-military objectives for the purpose of inspiring terror in the civil population.