Opportunities in Aviation

by Arthur Sweetser; Gordon Lamont

War flying calls for highly trained men, a man who has proved himself fit for combat under all conditions, a man who can shoot straight, think quickly, and turn immediately. He must possess a little more than the average nerve, perhaps, or he must be trained to the point where shooting and maneuvering are the natural reactions to certain circumstances. He must be able to stand altitudes of 20,000 feet; he must be quick with his machine-gun, have a knowledge of artillery, and know, in fact, a little about everything on the front he is trying to cover. This requires training and aptitude.

The day is coming for the man who wants to make a short pleasure flight, or go from town to town, touring by air. He need know nothing of machine-guns or warfare. He may never want to do anything more hazardous in the way of maneuver than a gentle turn. His maximum altitude would be perhaps 8,000 feet. He would in all probability be flying a machine whose "ceiling" was 10,000 feet, and he might never care to tour at a height higher than 2,000 feet. There is no reason why he should go high. One can have all the thrills in the world at 2,000 feet, follow the ground more easily, without wasting time or gasolene in attempts to fly high enough so that the earth looks like another planet below.

Let us illustrate a bit from the Royal Air Force of Canada, which is as good as any other example. The experience of the flying service of one country has been essentially that of another country, and we Americans may yet learn of the air from the English. In England the air is just another medium of travel, as much a medium as the ground and water—but that is, of course, another story.

In 1917 the Royal Flying Corps, later incorporated into the Royal Air Force, came to Canada to take up the instruction of Canadian boys for flying in France. Americans enlisted with the pick of the Canadian youth, and droves were sent overseas. Very soon the cream had been skimmed off and there came a time when material was scarce. Meanwhile the war raged, and there was no option but to take drafted men from all sections, Montreal in particular. Many could not speak intelligible English, and few had enjoyed any educational advantages. The men who came as cadets to be trained as pilots in 1918 graded much lower in personal and physical qualifications than the type of the previous year. And yet these same drafted men, who had withstood for three and a half years the call of their country, had more control over their machines at the end of their course than the men of the year before.

At the end of four, five, or six hours' solo these men could do all the high maneuvers, commonly thought dangerous, such as the barrel roll, the loop, the stall turn, the Immelmann turn. An astounding showing compared to the boys of 1917, who were forbidden to stunt and who rarely disobeyed the orders. In our American service we had specially selected men. They were college men, tested, qualified, and picked. But our men—and it's no reflection on them—seldom did their higher maneuvers with less than fifty hours of solo flying.

There is just one answer—it is a matter entirely of training.

It might be said that the Canadian casualties on the Texas flying-fields near Fort Worth during the winter of 1917-18, when the Royal Air Force occupied two airdromes, were the cause of comment all over the country. There were fifty fatalities in twenty weeks of flying, and machine after machine came down in a fatal spinning-nose dive, or tail spin, as the Americans speak of the spin.

Shortly after the Royal Air Force returned to its airdromes in Canada in the middle of April the Gosport system of flying training, which had been used successfully in England, was begun on the Curtiss J.N. 4B-type training-plane. The result was an immediate and material decrease in fatal accidents. In July, 1918, there was one fatality for every 1,760 hours of flying, and by October fatalities had been reduced to one in every 5,300 hours of flying. That is a remarkable achievement, as official data from other centers of training show one death in a flying accident for every 1,170 hours.

Briefly, the Gosport system is a graduated method of flying instruction. The cadet is led by easy steps through the earlier part of the training, and only after he has passed aerial tests in the simpler methods of control is he allowed to continue with the rest of his course and "go solo." The scheme provides that before he goes solo he must have spun, and shown that he can take his instructor out of a spin. Only then is he considered fit to go on his own.

"Dangerous" and "Safe" as terms to describe flying technique gave way to wrong and right. There was built up under sound instruction one of the best schools of flying in North America, the School of Special Flying, at Armour Heights, Ontario. There is no reason why there should not be established in this country a number of such schools, under men who have had army experience, to train great numbers of civilian fliers within the next few years. There is going to be a strong demand for the best flying instruction that can be given. It should be noted that only the most perfect system of flying instruction should be used, for the best is safest, and the safest, no matter how expensive, is comparatively cheap.