Aeration

“ At that moment, as if in answer to his desperate cry, there came the ominous roar of a powerful motor, high up in the air, and there came the great airship, swooping down with its seventy-two feet of planes magnificently outspread, and Alan Hope standing out on the lower runway, swinging deadly bombs in his hand. ”

“ Our aviator swings free in a great circle, banks, and at top speed makes back to his air-line patrol, while the German Archies open up on him with redoubled violence, as, serenely confident, he hums along his way.
It is truly wonderful what a fire an aeroplane can pass through quite unscathed as far as actual hinderance to flight is concerned. Many a time you can count nearly two hundred wreathing balls of smoke in the track of [43] the machine, and yet it sails placidly onward as though the air were the native element of its pilot and the attentions of Archie nonexistent. ”

“ Then against our aerostat, and with the wind driving them clean overhead of us, come the antagonistic flying-machines. I incline to imagine there will be a steel prow with a cutting edge at either end of the sort of aerostat I foresee, and conceivably this aerial ram will be the most important weapon of the affair. When operating against balloons, such a fighting-machine will rush up the air as swiftly as possible, and then, with a rapid contraction of its bladders, fling itself like a knife at the sinking war-balloon of the foe. ”

“ Employment of Aircraft in Large Bodies. Air Tactics. In some of the previous Chapters (Chapter VII., et seq.) the question of aircraft fighting—i.e., aeroplane versus aeroplane—has been considered, and matters such as armament have been fully discussed. We shall now deal with the employment of the armed machine in its fighting capacity, not as a single unit, but as part of a force whose function is the destruction of the armed air fleet of the enemy, and the crippling of his reconnaissance service. ”

“ You see, Jerry, the big outstanding feature of the war across the water has been the work done by two recent inventions, the submarine and the aeroplane. That set me thinking. The water isn't deep enough around here to do much experimenting with submarines, but there's dead oodles of air. So aeroplanes it had to be. Now, the aircraft have been a distinct disappointment, except as scouting helps, because the high speed of the aeroplanes makes accurate bomb-dropping almost impossible. ”

“ A whirr that sounded loud and insistent above the dull roar of the heavy guns, a sudden movement that quickly increased in velocity until the plane was bounding like a rabbit over the open ground, then an upward slant, a beautiful curve that left the ground behind, and another air pilot was off for the post of duty. ”

“ As may be surmised, the duties of the pilot were not merely to steer and keep a lookout ahead, but also to watch the machine and counteract the influence of unexpected air currents and those atmospheric obstructions like “pockets,” indistinguishable puffs of air, and the like, which are always very dangerous and will jolt an airship exactly as a rock or piece of wood will bounce an automobile into the air and maybe completely overturn it. Among experienced aeronauts, these air-ruts are recognized as being one of the chief perils in aviation. ”

“ These German airships were held together by rib-like skeletons of steel and aluminium and a stout inelastic canvas outer-skin, within which was an impervious rubber gas-bag, cut up by transverse dissepiments into from fifty to a hundred compartments. These were all absolutely gas tight and filled with hydrogen, and the entire aerostat was kept at any level by means of a long internal balloonette of oiled and toughened silk canvas, into which air could be forced and from which it could be pumped. ”

“ Air Tactics. It may be laid down that the independent air fleet, in order that it shall be capable of fulfilling the duties assigned to it, must be strong by virtue of numbers. In order to destroy—i.e., not merely to drive away—the active aircraft of the enemy, it must be of decisively higher speed, so that the enemy, whether reconnaissance or fighting machines, will be compelled to surrender or give battle. ”

“ So the airship could be made either heavier or lighter than air, and losses of weight through the consumption of fuel, the casting of bombs and so forth, could also be compensated by admitting air to sections of the general gas-bag. ”

“ A yell of exultation rose from the watching Germans, who knew that an explosion close to an aeroplane is often sufficient, through the force of air concussion alone, to crumple the flimsy wings and bring it down, even though none of the flying shrapnel from the bursting bomb actually touch the operator or the machine. ”

“ A lot of cavalry men are up trench-digging and I have had my first experience of being up really close to the firing-line. It doesn't take one long to get from here to the thick of things, and we were soon apprised of the fact by heavy and ponderous crashes. Just above us a British aeroplane was winging its flight towards the German lines. Presently one saw small flashes of flame in the air all around it, followed by curious little puffs of smoke; then came the sound of exploding shells; you know that light travels faster than sound. ”

“ Tom then briefly described the principle on which his aerial warship would work, explaining how the lifting gas would raise it, with its load of crew, guns and explosives, high into the air; how it could then be sent ahead, backward, to either side, or around in a circle, by means of the propellers and the rudders, and how it could be raised or lowered, either by rudders or by forcing more gas into the lifting bags, or by letting some of the vapor out. ”

“ Driven irresistibly forward by the most powerful propellers ever devised by man, that vast mass of steel surrendered and slid jolting forward for twenty yards or so, scattering the spectators wildly. With a bound the huge craft rose into the still air and plunged forward and upward on a forty-five degree angle at rapidly increasing speed. ”

“ The air craft hovered above our heads, but we were forbidden to fire at it, the extremely difficult, almost vertical aim promising little success, aside from the danger of our bullets falling back among us. Our reserves in the rear had apparently sighted the air craft too, for soon we heard a volley of rifle fire from that direction and simultaneously the aeroplane arose and disappeared in the clouds. ”

“ To accomplish these results the aeroplane must fly at a sufficient elevation to render difficult the hitting of a vital part of the machine or the aviator by hostile rifle or artillery fire. While the modern rifle in use in our army will fire a ball about three thousand five hundred yards straight in the air, it is generally accepted among aviators that an aeroplane would be practically safe, save from a chance shot, at three thousand five hundred feet. ”

“ A German aeroplane flew overhead on the way behind our lines, shot at all the way by our anti-aircraft guns, but very bold. Our kite-balloons, white as snow-clouds in the blue sky, stared over the battlefield where our men are still fighting in the midst of great shell-fire. ”

“ Another glance would show one of them suspended bottom up, falling sidewise, tipped vertically on a wing, standing on its tail, as though being blown about by the wind, out of all control. It is only in the air, when moving with them, that one can really appreciate the variety and grace of movement of a flock of high-powered avions de chasse. ”

“ The view, from the air, of a heavy bombardment, or of an infantry attack under cover of barrage fires, is a truly terrible spectacle, and in the air one has a feeling of detachment which is not easily overcome.
Yet it must be overcome, as I have said, and cannot say too many times for the benefit [188] of any young airman who may read this journal. During an offensive the air swarms with planes. They are at all altitudes, from the lowest artillery réglage machines at a few hundreds of metres, to the highest avions de chasse at six thousand meters and above. ”

“ None of the designers of airships and aeroplanes had known clearly what their inventions might have to fight; many had not imagined they would have to fight anything whatever in the air; and had planned them only for the dropping of explosives. ”

“ Still was the night as yet, but it would not be for long with those opposing air forces ready for a death grapple. While the ten battleplanes, each piloted by a Yankee ace with a splendid record, engaged the flotilla of enemy aircraft, the bombers must be at their more humble but equally important business. ”

“ But, after all, she's only the natural outcome of the air-gun, which has been known for generations. An air-gun is shaped like a rifle, with a hollow boiler or reservoir of power. You force into the reservoir by means of a condensing syringe as much air-power as it will hold. ”

“ If, then, gas seems destined to replace the bullet and the shell, so equally does the aeroplane appear likely to supersede the gun as the means of projection—and, like gas, aircraft are a weapon not exclusively military, but resting on a civil basis. ”

“ Even before the 'plane responds to some sudden gust of wind, or drops into a hole in the air, the trained aviator will foresee precisely what is about to happen. He reads it in some little thrill of his lever, a quiver in the frame, as the trained boxer reads in his antagonist's eyes the sort of blow that is coming. ”

“ Wounds in the wings are harmless. But the puncture of the fuel tank almost certainly means an explosion and the death of the aviator in the flame thousands of feet in the air. During an air battle before Arras, a British aviator encountered this fate. When his tank was struck and the fusillage, or body, of his machine burst into flames, he knew that he was lost. ”

“ The navy and the air. The German menace hastens the making of our air service. The British air force at the outbreak of the war, and at its close. The achievement of the British air force. Uses of aircraft in war extended and multiplied—reconnaissance, artillery observation, photography, contact patrol, battle in the air, bombing. Naval developments—kite balloons, coast patrol, convoy of vessels, seaplanes and seaplane-carriers, work against submarines. Secret dropping of agents. Development of machines. New scientific devices. Men of science and men of action. ”

“ All-important will be these aerial battles; granted a country wins supremacy in the air, its blows by land or sea can be delivered with a crushing force, unhampered either by attacks or spying from above. This fact is realised by every War Department of Europe. Aerial warfare is being studied closely; and the first armed craft, though they carry small guns, will pave the way for a powerful, armoured, multi-engined cruiser of the clouds. ”

“ The sudden burst of power shot the big airship suddenly skyward on an angle of almost eighty degrees and with a suddenness which nearly threw both Ned and Alan off their feet. The huge propeller began to whirl with dizzying velocity, and the wind screeched and whined through the propellers like an animal in pain. ”

“ As jet succeeded jet, each rising nearer and nearer to his brig, the interval of time between them seeming fearfully to diminish, he muttered oath upon oath. The last leap that the shell made on the water was at about a quarter of a mile’s distance of the islet on which his people had deposited at least a hundred and fifty barrels of his spurious flour, thence it flew, as it might be without an effort, with a grand and stately bound into the very centre of the barrels, exploding at the moment it struck. ”

“ But in a few moments, the air rushing into the folds of the parachute, forces them open like an umbrella, and immediately, owing to the wide surface which this contrivance presents to the atmosphere, the violence of the descent is arrested, and the aeronaut falls gently to the ground, without receiving too rude a shock. ”

“ Let the wing of a Boche but show above the smoke and they would be upon him in hordes, beating him to the ground, enveloping him in flames, annihilating him before he had a chance to observe, much less to report. ”

“ Special guns have been built which will point into the air, can be sighted quickly, and will fire a shell to a great height. If an aircraft comes within range of them, and the gunner has time to aim correctly, a bursting shell may bring the machine to ground. ”

“ The steam breath gradually grows and is exhaled with more vigor. Presently he belches up a barrel or so of water which falls back into his throat. Then in a minute come two or three such little spasms, when up lifts a rounded column two or three feet in diameter, rising higher and higher in exact perpendicularity 150 feet high. The jet breaks more or less as it rises into pointed sprays, which, when there is no wind blowing, fall with almost precise regularity about the up going column. ”

“ The flat Asiatic airships kept high above the Germans and behind them, and fired unanswered bullets into their gas-chambers and upon their flanks—the one-man flying-machines hovered and alighted like a swarm of attacking bees. ”

“ The airship is, therefore, nothing else than a dirigible balloon, for the engines and other weights connected with the structure are supported in the air by an envelope or balloon, or a series of such chambers, according to design, filled with hydrogen or gas of some other nature. ”

“ Then with reference to the resistance to the air of the wings he explains: 'The air when struck offers resistance by its elastic virtue through which the particles of the air compressed by the wing-beat strive to expand again. Through these two causes of resistance the downward beat of the wing is not only opposed, but even caused to recoil with a reflex movement; and these two causes of resistance ever increase the more the down stroke of the wing is maintained and accelerated. ”