“I just wanted you to know what would happen if the engine suddenly stopped in the midst of one of your turns. You must quickly put on more bank and more rudder. If you don’t do this in time, you’ll find the plane out of control. Try a few more turns and I’ll stop the motor in some of them and you correct for it.”
After a few more minutes of such practice they landed and rejoined the others.
Kiwi was bubbling over with the excitement of what he had learned and he had a thousand questions to ask both Dad and Armbruster about his experiences. They talked it all over and tried to tell him what he must do in each emergency.
If the engine stopped unexpectedly when flying straight, he must instinctively push the stick forward, keep the nose down, and keep his flying speed. If it stopped during a turn, he must rudder into the turn and keep his flying speed. Always he must do these things instinctively when the motor failed.
Dad and Armbruster and Jack all had stories to tell of some spectacular experience when motors failed at crucial moments in the air. Always when in the air the pilot’s ear is attuned to the steady beat of the motor and he listens for its first missing stroke.
Another young flyer had joined the group and was listening interestedly to the talk about failing motors. During a lull in the conversation he said:
“Failing motors in the air are often bad enough, I grant you, but during the war a failing motor on solid ground turned out to be much more tragic for me.
“I had just returned to my squadron from a two weeks’ stay in England and was talking to old friends and getting accustomed to the new faces in the mess. The other pilots were admiring the new outfit I had bought—shiny new field boots that I had had made at that little shop in Oxford opposite Exeter College, my whipcord breeches that were the pride of a maker on the Haymarket in London, while my tunic came from Regent street—when an orderly came up and handed me a slip of paper. It requested me to report to the Major at once.
“I hurried over to the squadron office to my commanding officer. He looked up when I entered and said:
“‘I know you are just back from leave and may not have your bearings yet, but the people at the Wing Headquarters have just given me a job which is in your special line. You have done it so many times before that you should have no trouble this time. We have another spy to land back of the lines tonight, and since Gathergood is gone, you are the only man I have who can do the job. Here on this map is the location where you must land this fellow, and he’ll be here ready to start with you at eleven-thirty. I’ll have the Sergeant-Major get a good machine in readiness for you.’