The wireless station there sent messages to the aviator which he was unable to pick up, but the station at Mount Pearl kept in continual touch with the machine through all the flight. After his flight the flier said that his speed while in the air had been on an average of 100 miles an hour.
The Martinsyde Plane Arrives
On April 2 Captain Frederick Phillips Raynham, the pilot of the Martinsyde aeroplane, and Captain Charles Willard Fairfax Morgan, navigator, arrived at St. John’s and began to make preparations for setting up their canvas hangar which was to house their aeroplane. The aerodrome selected was at the Quid Vivi. This site had been selected by Major Morgan about three months ago, and the tent was set up on that field as per the plans and specifications.
The biplane weighs, fully loaded, about 5,000 pounds and carries 360 gallons of gas, while the Sopwith weighs about 6,100 pounds and carries only 350 gallons. Raynham says he has a cruising radius of 2,000 miles with a twenty-mile head wind against him all the way across. But as the prevailing winds are from west to east, he expects to fly with the wind most of the way. The machine was designed by G. H. Handasyde, who has had many years’ designing experience in co-operation with H. P. Martin, chairman of Martinsydes.
The reappearance in the transatlantic attempt of a Martinsyde plane as a competitor for the Daily Mail prize recalls that the firm as early as 1914 entered for a transatlantic competition, having completed a monoplane which was to have started from St. John’s, the scene of the present venture. This machine was to have been flown by Gustave Hamel, who, it will be remembered, while flying from London to Paris, came down at Calais, ascended again, and has never since been heard of. He is believed to have been drowned in the North Sea, for no trace of his machine was ever found.
Captain Raynham
Captain Raynham is 25 years old. He began to fly at 17, being the possessor of half a dozen of the oldest flying licenses in England. Most of his experience has been in experimental and test flying.
Raynham went with Martinsydes in the early development days of 1907, and was with them when they began monoplane production in 1908. This they continued until the war began, when they turned to building biplanes, the present machine being only a very slight modification of their latest fighting scout.
The Martinsyde biplane was not especially designed for the transatlantic flight, but was taken from stock. It still carries its original fighting equipment, similar to that used during the war. The machine is named the “Raymor,” a combination of the names Raynham and Morgan.
The machine has a wing span of 41 feet and a lifting area of 500 square feet; over-all length, 26 feet; height, from ground to top of propeller, 10 feet 10 inches. The engine is a Rolls-Royce “Falcon,” which is rated at 285 horse-power. It has a capacity of developing up to 300 horse-power at a speed of 100 to 125 miles per hour. The cruising radius is 2,500 miles.