Prize of the air

by Ben Conlon

PRIZE OF THE AIR

By Ben Conlon

At a height of about two thousand feet Bill Barlow completed the loop and then flew into the wind over the landing “T”.

“Great stuff!” yelled his passenger, and Bill could hear his chuckle, for he had now throttled his motor and was making a quick bank to the left.

“Thought you’d like it,” he called back, “but it may get me in wrong down below.”

After making a complete circle, he landed just where he had intended to, and taxied up toward the hangars. It was a maneuver he had learned thoroughly years before, when he was a cadet flyer—this landing with a dead engine.

Bill’s passenger was smiling as he unbuckled his safety belt and climbed from the cockpit, but there was no smile on the face of the field superintendent who came running up to the plane.

“Hey, what’s the idea, Barlow?” he queried. “You know as well as I do that it’s against the law to loop with a passenger, don’t you?”

“That’s right.”