Learning to Fly: A Practical Manual for Beginners

by Claude Grahame-White; Harry Harper

CROSS-COUNTRY FLYING

When a pupil has finished his flying school tests, and has received his certificate from the Royal Aero Club, he is in a stage of proficiency which means that he has learned to control an aeroplane when above an aerodrome and in conditions that are favourable, and that he may be relied on to make no elementary mistakes. But as to cross-country flying, with its greater hazards, he is still a novice, with everything to learn. And so it is to flights from point to point, generally between neighbouring aerodromes, that he next devotes himself.

Aviators have been commiserated with, often, on what is thought to be the monotony of a cross-country flight. The pilot, raised to a lonely height above the earth, is pictured sitting more or less inertly in his seat, with nothing to do but retain his control on the levers, and look out occasionally so as to keep upon his course. But the beginner, when he first attempts cross-country flying, will have an impression not of inactivity, but of the necessity to be constantly on the alert. He will be engrossed completely by the manipulation of his machine, with no time to sit in idle speculation, or to analyse his feelings as the country passes away below.

When preliminaries on the ground have been gone through, and the pilot is in the air, there will first be a need to gain a height of several thousand feet. Altitude is essential in cross-country flying. The higher a pilot flies, within reason and having regard to the state of the atmosphere, the better chance will he have of making a safe landing, should his motor fail suddenly and force him to descend. So the first concern is climbing—and in doing so the pilot must remember the teachings of his instructor, and not force his craft on too steep or rapid an ascent. He may prefer, in his early flights, to remain above the aerodrome while he is gaining altitude, watching his height recorder from moment to moment so as to note his progress upward. He will be occupied also with his engine, listening to its rhythm of sound, and keeping an eye on the indicator that tells him how many revolutions per minute the motor is actually making, and which will warn him at once should it begin to fail.

Granted his motor is running well, a pilot should soon gain altitude. Then, assuming the air is clear—as it should be on his early flights—he will note some landmark, away on the line of his flight, and set off across country towards it. Fixed conveniently in front of him will be a map, of a kind devised specially for the use of aviators. A pilot's view, as he flies high above the ground, is bird-like. Landmarks fail to attract his attention, at this altitude, which would be clearly seen if he were on the ground. Hills, for example, unless they are high, are so dwarfed as he looks down on them that they scarcely catch his eye. What is done, by the designer of air maps, is to accentuate such details of a landscape as will prove conspicuous when seen from above. A river, or an expanse of water, is clearly seen; so also are railways and main roads; while factory chimneys, and large buildings which stand alone, may be identified from a distance when a pilot is in flight. So on an airman's map, made to stand out by various colourings in a way that catches the eye, are railways, roads, rivers, lakes and woods, with here and there a factory chimney or a church, should these be in a position rendering them visible easily from the air. That such maps should be bold in their design, and free from a mass of small details, is very necessary when it is remembered that the aviator, passing through the air at high speeds, has no time for a leisurely inspection of his map.

With a good map, and aided when necessary by the compass that is placed in a position so that he can see it readily, a pilot has no difficulty as a rule, once he has acquired the facility that comes with practice, in steering accurately from point to point, even when on a long flight. On a favourable day, when the land below is clearly visible, he will glance ahead, or to one side, and after observing some landmark, look on his map to identify the position he has just seen. Under such conditions steering is easy, and the compass plays a subsidiary part. But it may happen that, while he is on a long flight and at a considerable altitude, the earth below may be obscured by clouds, or a low-lying mist, and all landmarks vanish from his view. Sometimes too, he may find himself flying through mist and cloud, with all signs of the earth gone from below. Whereupon, robbed for awhile of any direct guidance, he must fly by aid of his map and compass, holding his machine on its compass course, and noting carefully the needle of his height-recorder, so that he is sure of maintaining altitude. A risk exists under such conditions, when there is no visible object by which to judge a course, that an airman may make leeway, unconsciously, under the pressure of a side-wind; and so he must be ready to note carefully, immediately that a view of the earth is vouchsafed him, whether he has actually been making leeway, either to one hand or the other, even while the bow of his machine has been held on its compass course. There is a risk also, when a pilot is flying in fog or at night, that, having no visible horizon from which to gauge the inclination of his craft, it may assume gradually some abnormal angle, without his own sensations telling him what is taking place. The craft may, for the sake of illustration, incline sideways, imperceptibly to the pilot, till it begins to side-slip. But science can meet this danger by providing inclinometers, fitted within the hull so that the aviator can see them easily; and by means of these instruments, which are illuminated at night, it is possible for a pilot to tell, merely by a glance, at what angle his machine is moving forward through the air—whether it is up or down at the bow, or whether its position laterally is normal.

The beginner, on his first cross-country flight, need not be troubled by such intricacies. He is flying, one assumes, on a fine day, with the land spread clearly below him. So as he moves through the air, listening always to the hum of his motor, he need have no fear, granted that his observation is ordinarily keen, of losing his way.

Naturally, being a novice, he will feel the responsibility of his position. His eyes will rove constantly from one instrument to another; as indeed, from habit, do those of a practised flyer. He will glance at the height recorder; then at the engine revolution indicator; then at the dial which tells him what his speed is relative to the air. There is a dial, also, showing the pressure in his petrol-tank; while there will be a clock on his dashboard at which he will glance occasionally, after he has marked some position away on the land below, so as to determine what progress he is making from the point of view of time.

Besides these preoccupations, and the ceaseless even if almost unconscious attention that he must pay to his engine, there is the need to bear constantly in his mind's eye the lie of the land. Should his motor fail suddenly, or something happen which necessitates an immediate descent, it is imperative that he should be able, without delay, to choose from the ground that is visible below him some field or open space that will provide a safe landing-point. And this is easier said than done. The earth, when viewed by a airman who looks down almost directly upon it, is apt to be deceptive as to its contour. A field that is selected say, from a height of several thousand feet, may not prove—as the aviator nears it in his glide—to be at all the haven he imagined it. More than once, seeking to alight on a field which appeared to him, as he was high above it, to be level as a billiard table, a pilot has found, when it is too late, that the ground has sloped so steeply that his machine, after landing, has run on downhill and ended by crashing into a fence or ditch.

It is very necessary for an airman to learn to judge, by its appearance, the difference between an expanse, say, of pasture land, or a field which is in green corn or standing hay. It has happened often that a pilot, descending after engine failure towards what he has reckoned a grass field, has discovered—when too low to change his landing-point—that his pasture land is actually a field of green corn; and a landing under such conditions, with the corn binding on the running-gear of the machine, may end in the aircraft coming to an abrupt halt, and then pitching forward on its nose; with a broken propeller and perhaps other damages in consequence.