Aerial achievement moves so fast nowadays that few people noticed the highly meritorious flight a few days ago of the Portuguese aviator, Lieut. Carlos Costa Macedo, chief instructor at the Portuguese Military Flying School, who flew from Hat-field to Lisbon, 1,110 miles, in 5 hr. 17 min., thus beating his own record, made in February 1935, by 48 min.
Lieut. Macedo's vehicle is the De Havilland Comet, now called "Splazar," which was" fi ubdér the name "Black Magic" in the England-Australia air races of 1934, which were won by C.W.A. Scott and T. Campbell Black in another Comet that flew from Mildenhall to Melbourne in 71 hours, It then belonged to the Mollisons, who led the field at the end of the first stage by flying non-stop to Baghdad—2530 miles—in 12 hr. 40 min. They reached Karachi from England in the record time of 22 hr. 13 min. but were obliged subsequently to abandon the contest.
Lieut. Macedo left Hatfield at noon in cloudy weather and against a southwesterly wind. He did not use radio and planned to fly above the clouds till he reached the promised good weather over France. The best cruising speed of the Comet is reached at a height of 10,000 ft. and high flying was. therefore, also in the interests of speed. His route went v way of Brighton, Lo Havre, Biarrit and Salamanca. The pilot lence in himself and his aircraft is revealed in the fact that he took only 170 gallons of fuel—enough for seven hours flying—though the total tankage the Salazar is 257 gallons.
A few days earlier 2nd-Lieut. Jean Péraud, flying one of the two Comet aeroplanes which belong to the rench Government, achieved almost equally good average speed on a one-day journey from Paris to Tunis and back. Péraud has been in train-m.p.h. at 15,000 ft.
Its service ceiling, where the rate of climb has fallen to 100 feet a minute, is 25,000 ft. Carrying full bomb-load, it climbs from sea-level to 10,000 fi. in 8 min. 24 sec. and to ing for some time for a series of fast long flights in this machine and he is soon to undertake more ambitious journeys.
An Anti aircraft Fleet 20,000 ft. in 21 min. 24 sec, At this height it can still fly at 250 m p.h.
The Battle's best speed at sea-level, without abnormal use of the engine, only 210 miles an hour, indicating the superior performance of aircraft with supercharged engines at great heights and revealing, incidentally, that the supercharged aircraft does not show nearly its best paces near sea-level.
Landing speed. with trail g edge flaps in operation, is 60 m.p. and the ratio between maximum and minimum flying speed is, therefore, more than 4 to 1—an excellent enggineering achievement The range at normal cruising speed with full normal load is 1,000 miles.
Structurally, the Battle conforms largely to the modern essed-skin formula, in which the cute: of wings and fuselage cam of the loads and stresses imposed on the aeroplane in flight Fuel is carried in two tanks locat ed in the wing roots. An ex the fuselage can be arrau lenz flights. Ethyl the engine.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.