London, June 3.
The British Navy will soon possess 700 of the speediest, most modern first-line planes built in Great Britain. Already the naval air fleet is up-to-date and includes powerful craft with the latest in the way of equipment, Most of these will be retained, but a number will be replaced by yet faster, more heavily-armed craft, One of the most popular models ioday is a fast Blackburn bomber equipped with special brake-ailerons which permit it to slow down power dives at any moment. This increases the potential accuracy of bombing attacks, giving the pilots more time in which to sight his bombs and aerial torpedos, Another model is a Blackburn monoplane all-metal pursuit plant, This type is powered by a newlyrpatented Bristol - Perseus sleeve-valve engine.
Then there are also biplane Sea Gladiator fighting craft, special biplane Gloster Gladiator pursuits and biplane Swordfish models equipped mainly for attacks with aerial tor-pedes for missiles. The last-named will shortly be replaced with new models of Albatross craft.
The Air Ministry also revealed today details of a type of Vickers-Wellington bomber which will be built on the revolutionary geodesic aerial structure plan.
full load, this bomber will have a range of 3250 miles with an average speed of 260 miles ph. when propelled by two nine cylinder air-cooled Bristol Pegasus engines. Two more models of the same plane will be equipped respectively with two twelve-cylinder liquid cooled Rolls Royce Merlin engines and with two sleeve-valve Hercules engines. Both these latter models being more powerful will have a greater range coupled with more speed. With five men on board and five machine guns, the Wellington plane can fly up to 26,000 ft.
The "geodesic" system of structure replacing the metal girders type of construction, is a sort of rigid metal netting which follows the curves of the wings and fuselage surface. It means ugher construction and more foam inside the wings for fuel tanks and bombs.—Havas.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.