The Spirit of ST Louis (14 page)

PARIS PLANE TESTED

AMERICAN LEGION SHOWS
HIGH SPEED IN SURPRISE
FLIGHT

BRISTOL, PENN., Apr. 9. – Lieut. Commander Noel Davis took his Keystone Pathfinder biplane, the American Legion, off on its maiden flight here today, with Lieut. Stanton H. Wooster at his side as co-pilot. The speed with which his big ship has been constructed was a surprise to everyone who has been watching the progress of the various transatlantic flight projects. It threw consternation into the camps of his rivals.

"The plane handles beautifully." Commander Davis said. "But we want to test it thoroughly: we are not going to leave anything to chance."

Meanwhile, construction is progressing rapidly on the trimotored Fokker with which Commander Richard E. Byrd expects to make a non-stop flight between New York and Paris next month. Commander Byrd's plane will be
christened the "America" - -

Commander Byrd emphasized the fact that the flight is to be made solely in the interests of aeronautic science and international good will - - -

21

On the Ryan factory floors the workmen are out to set a record in construction time -- they're reading the papers too. They know how desperately I want to be in New York by the end of April. They have been watching the reports about Nungesser's final preparations in France, about Byrd's transatlantic Fokker, about Chamberlin and the Bellanca, about Davis and Wooster. Every expedition is ahead of me. A single day's delay might make the difference between success and failure, and they are determined that the responsibility for such a disappointment won't lie with the man in the shop. Each of them is striving to do a quicker and better job on the Spirit of St. Louis than he's ever done before. No pains are too great, and no hours too long; lights sometimes burn in the factory all through the night. Donald Hall worked for one stretch of thirty-six hours, without sleep. The only good-natured grumbling I've heard in the shop was when Hall sent down drawings that called for fuselage fairings to an accuracy of one thirty-second of an inch. Then Superintendent Bert Tindale remarked that he'd never before been asked to hold such accuracy. But I saw him working there the rest of the afternoon with a scale on which the inches were divided into thirty-seconds.

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In this second month of construction I have plenty of free time. Instruments and emergency equipment have all been ordered, and, except for a few items, have arrived. Practically all the details of my plans are laid. I've considered every contingency I can think of that might arise during the flight -- how much weather to push through, how to locate my position on the European coast, what to do if I have to land at sea, how to find Paris if I make my landfall after dark, and a hundred other possibilities. I've studied wind roses over the North Atlantic for April, May, and June until I practically know them all by heart -- especially those disturbing, short blue arrows that indicate the percentage of head winds.

I make a point of spending part of each day at the factory. In good weather I often go out to Dutch Flats and fly one of the company's machines. None of them has a Whirlwind engine; but they perform well with their wartime Hispanos, and they teach me the characteristics of high-wing monoplanes.

ENDURANCE PLANE SMASHES
WORLD'S RECORD

CHAMBERLIN AND ACOSTA
MORE THAN TWO DAYS
IN AIR

NEW YORK. April 14.—The world's endurance record for aircraft returned to the United States yesterday when two weary aviators, Clarence D. Chamberlin and Bert Acosta, landed their Bellanca monoplane on Roosevelt Field, Long Island, after 51 hours, 11 minutes. and 25 seconds aloft. They exceeded by nearly six hours the previous endurance record which was established in August, 1925, by two French Army officers, Drouhin and Landry. at Etampes.

WANT TO FLY ATLANTIC

Tired but happy, both flyers are anxious to be the first to make the New York to Paris flight, across the Atlantic Ocean. Giuseppe Bellanca, the designer, said his plane could be made ready for the ocean flight within three days, but that much mere time would be used for careful preparation.

Charles A. Levine, chairman of the Columbia Aircraft Corporation, which plans on building Bellanca Aircraft, said that preparations would be rushed to permit the Bellanca to be the first plane to complete the New York to Paris Sight---

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Well, that's the record I've hoped to break. Maybe I still can break it. In the Spirit of St. Louis I'll have the extra pilot's weight in fuel. Other things being equal, that should give me a fifty-gallon advantage over the Bellanca. But as far as the New York-to-Paris flight is concerned, there's no use blinding myself to reality. Almost everyone else would have to fail before my project can succeed—and everyone else seems to be getting along wonderfully well. I was too far behind in starting. I probably won't even fly my plane through to New York, to say nothing of taking off for Paris.

I've already purchased charts and begun laying out a transpacific flight by way of the Hawaiian Islands. I could land on all five continents, and fly around the world. That might be even more worth while and interesting than the flight from New York to Paris. Of course navigation would be difficult. I'd need either directional radio or a navigator to be sure of striking the small, mid-ocean islands; but the longest nonstop distance would be less than 2,500 miles. I'd have over a thousand miles extra fuel range to turn into equipment weight. And I've heard of an electrical engineer in Los Angeles who thinks he can build an aircraft radio set that has reliability and long range, with a weight of less than forty pounds. I'm going to get in touch with him this week.

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AMERICA CRASHES ON TEST
FLIGHT

BYRD, BENNETT, AND NOVILLE
INJURED, FOKKER PILOTING
CRAFT AT TIME

NEW YORK, April 16.—The big trimotored Fokker monoplane which Commander Richard Evelyn Byrd and his crew were preparing for the transatlantic flight between New York and Paris crashed at Teterboro airport at 6:00 o'clock this afternoon. The machine was coming in for a landing after its first trial flight when it overturned, injuring three of the four members of its crew. Damage to the plane itself was serious, but can be repaired according to Anthony J. Fokker who was at the controls during the landing, and the only one uninjured.

The accident may force Commander Byrd to abandon his plans for a transoceanic flight this spring - - -

Tony Fokker has cracked up! Every member of the Byrd crew has been injured. I can hardly believe the sentences my eyes are reading. Much as I want to be the first to start for Paris, I don't wish my competitors hard luck. Crashed planes and flyers in hospitals impair all of aviation, and destroy the joy of flight. Apparently the Fokker just nosed over on the field. Its tail hadn't been loaded down enough. The nose structure, holding the center engine, collapsed and crushed Floyd Bennett's leg.

That's one of the things I don't like about big planes, and forward cockpits. If a small plane, like the Spirit- of St. Louis, with the cockpit in the rear, noses over, the pilot isn't likely to be hurt at all.

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The third week of April is crammed with the endless details which precede the completion of a new airplane. An atmosphere of tension and expectancy pervades the entire factory. Mahoney remarks dryly that there's no use thinking about producing other machines until the Spirit of St. Louis is out of the way -- as though he himself hadn't ordered the construction of my plane rushed ahead of everything else. Each workman has some finishing touch to add before he's ready to call his job completed. They all sign their names on the front wing-spar, before the fabric covering is added, "to ride along on the flight for good luck."

I am working on lists for the flight arrangements I must make at every stop, from San Diego through to Paris. I open my little black notebook, and read them again:

TO BE ARRANGED FOR:
San Diego Take-Off

Stop mail: leave address

Pack and address suitcase

Wire day of arrival to Knight and Wassail Notify papers

Start motor at:

Take off at:

St. Louis Arrival

Taxi to position near N.G. hangars Arrange for care of plane

Arrange for guard

Wire Ryan Airlines

Arrange for quarters

Arrange for servicing

Total gal. gas —

Total gal. oil —

(Chamois gas, screen oil)

Arrange final flight details

Wire for necessary arrangements at N.Y. Complete St. Louis business

Arrange for future mail and express

St. Louis Take-Off

Notify papers and C. M. Young

Wire Roosevelt Field Weather Bureau, Wright, Pioneer, N.A.A.

Notify papers

Start motor at --

Take off at —

N.Y. Arrival

Arrange for care of plane

Arrange for guard

Wire St. Louis and Ryan Airlines

Arrange for quarters on field

Arrange for weather reports, motor overhaul. instrument check

Light code

N.Y. Take-Off

Notify papers

Have time of take-off wired to St. Louis and Ryan Airlines

Paris Arrival

Arrange for care of ship

Arrange for guard

Cable St. Louis, Ryan Airlines, Wright Aero, Mother, Standard Oil, Union Oil

Arrange for clothes

Arrange for quarters

I've completed about all the arrangements I can before I'm ready to start. San Diego and St. Louis won't be difficult. I have plenty of friends in both places. New York and Paris will be the problems. I don't know anyone I can count on for help in either city.

As to my personal and emergency equipment, it's all purchased—flying suit, canteens, Army rations, rubber raft, pump, repair kit, flares -- everything I can think of I may need that comes within the weight allowance I've set. At first I couldn't find any red flares. Then I bought four of the kind railroads use for danger signals. I've got each one sealed up watertight in a piece of bicycle inner tube. I opened one of the cans of Army rations as a test. Inside were three bars of a dry, chocolatelike concoction. The taste is awful. You'd have to be pretty hungry to eat the stuff; but for me, that's probably an advantage.

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NUNGESSER TO TAKE OFF
SUNDAY ON OCEAN FLIGHT

PARIS, Apr. 19.—Captain Charles Nungesser, the great French ace, announced that if weather conditions are favorable, he will take off from Le Bourget Airdrome at daybreak Sunday morning on a nonstop flight for New York –

If Nungesser is ready to start on Sunday, the Bellanca is the only American plane that can beat him to the take-off. I wonder what has been holding Chamberlin back. Maybe this next article will throw some light on the question:

MAIL PILOT TO NAVIGATE
BELLANCA ON PARIS FLIGHT

NEW YORK, Apr. 19.—An announcement issued at the offices of the Columbia. Aircraft Corporation stated ,that Lloyd W. Bertaud had been chosen as navigatior for the Bellanca monoplane on its projected non-stop flight between New York and Paris. Bertaud has been an air-mail pilot for two years, and has the reputation of being one of the best night flyers on the eastern division.

The other man in the plane will be either Acosta or Chamberlin. "The choice will not be made until the last minute before the flight," Mr. Levine said, "and it will then be determined by lot. Both pilots will appear upon the field in flying togs. Their names will be written separately on slips of paper. One slip will be drawn. The name on it will decide the flyer."

The selection of Bertaud came as a surprise to followers of the New York to Paris projects. After their successful record-setting endurance flight, it was thought that Chamberlin and Acosta would fly the plane over the Atlantic together.

It is now estimated that the Bellanca will take off within the next ten days. ---