By far the most difficult of his problems is the art of landing. As we have already seen the speed of an airplane cannot be reduced below a certain danger line if its wings are to continue to support it in the air. This danger line varies with different types of airplanes, but in all of them the engine must be kept running at a fairly high speed or the whole structure will come crashing to the earth. To bring an airplane to earth while it is traveling at a speed of 75 miles an hour is no mean accomplishment. It must not bump down heavily upon the ground, or its landing chassis will be broken, even if no more serious accident occurs. It must settle slowly until its wheels just touch, while all the time it is moving forward at the rate of a fast express train. This is an art that requires infinite practise to acquire, but it is one of the most important feats the student airman has to learn.
However, the long wished-for day finally arrives when he can be trusted to go aloft by himself. Carefully he goes over every inch of his machine, to be sure it is in A-1 condition. He inspects the engine and tests every strut and wire, then, satisfied that it is in prime working order, he climbs into his seat. That is one of the most thrilling moments connected with his aviation training. In all other flights he has known that the errors he might make could be corrected by the trusty instructor. Now he must rely solely upon himself. With a feeling of mastery and conquest, he goes skimming into the air. He longs to prove himself. Probably he does, and not long after he receives permission to try for an aviator's certificate. This is the certificate issued by the Aero Club of America; it does not make him a full-fledged military aviator, but it marks the completion of the first stage of his progress toward the coveted goal.
In order to acquire the aviator's certificate, the candidate must accomplish two long distance flights and one altitude flight; he must be able to cut figures of eight and to land without the slightest injury to his machine. In other words he must prove to the satisfaction of his examiners that he is able to handle an airplane skilfully, barring of course any fancy exploits in the air.
He now launches on his advanced course of training. This will require at least three months of hard work, and during that time he must learn to fly a number of different types of machines which are used in military aviation. In the meantime he may perhaps go up for examination to acquire the much-coveted “wings.” But do not imagine that they mark the end of his education. With the aviator it is very much as with the schoolboy: when he finishes one grade or stage of his progress he passes on to a still more difficult. The man who has acquired “wings” is not immune from the most trying daily routine of studies, which include the ever important map-reading, photography, aerial gunnery and what-not.
Copyright Underwood and Underwood
A PHOTOGRAPH MADE TEN THOUSAND FEET IN THE AIR, SHOWING MACHINES IN “V” FORMATION AT BOMBING PRACTICE
Finally, however, there does come a day when the army aviator may be said to pass out of the elementary school of classes and instructors into the broader school of experience. Many young American aviators who served during the War can look back upon such a day with a thrill. They had then their hardest lessons to learn. The map-reading, the gunnery, the trying and tedious curriculum of the aviation school become suddenly vital issues, and the facts which were learned in the classroom have to be mastered anew by living them in the air. The experience of one young airman on his first real assignment goes to show how the problems which seemed so easy of solution on the ground become unexpectedly difficult when the flyer is face to face with them for the first time up there above the clouds. Fresh from his course of training, he had been ordered to take an airplane from one government hangar to another which was close up behind the front lines. He knew his “map-reading” pretty well, but he had never made a long cross-country flight before and the ground was unfamiliar. Somewhere near his destination he made a false turn, and the first intimation that reached him of the fact that he was off his course was the appearance below him of white puffs of smoke—“cream puffs” as the airmen have jokingly nicknamed them. He realized with a start that he was over the enemy's lines and was being fired at. Without losing any time he turned his face toward home, and this time he succeeded in spotting the lost hangar and making a safe landing. But he had learned a little lesson in following his map which no instructor could have taught him half so well.
