One difficult feat was set the competing machines. This was that they should rise, when fully loaded, from a ploughed field. Hitherto, of course, only smooth ground had been considered suitable for the ascent of a machine. An appreciable number passed even this test successfully. Their ability to do so was due to the fitting of exceptionally-strong landing devices of the wheel and skid type, and to ample engine-power.
In all, seven aeroplanes emerged triumphantly from all the trials imposed. The winning machine, which owed its final triumph to its high speed, was the Nieuport monoplane. Even when heavily laden with pilot, passenger, and fuel, it flew across country at the rate of more than seventy miles an hour.
One of the most impressive features of the trials was the reliability shown by the competing machines. They made voyage after voyage with the regularity of express trains. The striking aspect of the tests, indeed, was the practical demonstration of the fact that not one French builder, but dozens, could make a thoroughly-efficient war aeroplane.
It was shown conclusively, also, that it is no longer necessary to wait for calm weather before embarking upon aeroplane flights. In astonishingly high winds—blowing, in some cases, at a velocity of approximately forty miles an hour—the large military machines went out and, ascending 1000 or 1500 feet, battled triumphantly against vicious gusts.
A striking point in connection with the competition was the big horse-power of the engines employed. There was a vivid contrast, indeed, between the motors now used and the little three-cylindered, twenty-five horse-power engine with which Blériot crossed the Channel in 1909.
Many of the machines taking part in the contest were fitted with fourteen-cylinder hundred horsepower "Gnome" motors; and some employed even higher power than this, being equipped with engines developing a hundred and forty horse-power. Such big power was, of course, necessary in view of the loads which were carried, and the arduous nature of some of the tests.
To indicate the weights raised, it may be mentioned that the Breguet biplane, which was driven by a hundred and forty horse-power "Gnome," weighed, with pilot, two passengers, and fuel aboard, 2420 lb.
Representatives from all the great countries in the world, including Great Britain, visited Rheims to witness these military tests, and the French manufacturers who produced successful machines were quickly supplied with sufficient orders to keep their factories busy for a long time to come.
The value of the flying work accomplished in these trials, and the obvious practicability of military machines, stimulated interest not only in France, but in Russia, Germany, and other countries. It was, undoubtedly, the means of determining our War Office to make a move. In view of what was achieved at Rheims, in fact, there no longer remained any possible excuse for refraining from a constructive policy in military aviation.
III. Germany’s aerial policy—Secret energies in creating a fleet of war aeroplanes—Rivalry with France.