How Pan American Airways Are Bridging

The Pacific New Base at Noumea Built on Ruins of Old Convict Settlement

The wonderful work that Pan American Airways now are doing in pioneering and charting the Central and South Pacific Ocean for sea-plane communications, and in equipping bases for the safe handling of passengers and mails on the Trans pacific services, is described in this article by Brian Stein, of “Pacific Islands Monthly” staff, who recently visited New Caledonia. PA A, for their recently established South Pacific service, have provided bases at Canton Island, Noumea and Auckland; and another base, to be

used in the same service, is now being constructed by the British authorities near Suva, Fiji.

Four years ago, there were indications that Pan American Airways and Im perial Airways would compete bitterly for the traffic available in the South Pacific. To-day, British and Americans are co-operatnig, in an effort to jointly supply an important service. A sign of the times.

PAN American Airways organisation at Noumea, New Caledonia, can be divided into three parts: First, the base where the Boeing flying boats are serviced and the passengers disembark.

Second, accommodation for these pas sengers is provided in the luxury yacht “Southern Seas”.

Third, the radio station at Magenta, just out of Noumea.

Noumea Harbour (see panoramic photo graph in this issue) is formed by two is lands—He Brun and He Nou —which run along- the coast for several miles, across the mouth of a deep indentation in the mainland. On the mainland side of He Nou, about 21 miles from Noumea, is Nouville. Here amid the ruins of the old penal colony, where fifty years ago thou sands of unhappy criminals and politi cal undesirables were housed in huge concrete prisons, PAA has built its base.

The old prisons slowly are crumbling away; but, a little apart from the main group of buildings, there is a walled-off compound which has taken on a new, modern appearance. This site, chosen by Pan American Airways as a base, was once the prison warders’ residence, and the high, brick wall surrounding the buildings and grounds was built in case the prisoners managed to get loose, and turn on their guardians.

In May, 1939, the PAA officials who were to supervise the construction of the base arrived at Nouville. They found the old warders’ compound in ruins, sur rounded by masses of bramble and brush.

In just 101 weeks, however, they an nounced that they were ready to re ceive a plane. An amazing transforma tion had been made; a large cement building had been constructed on the foundations of the warders’ house, and several other buildings, workshops, etc., had been erected.

To-day, clean white gravel paths run between well laid-out lawns; a number of trees provide shade, and flowers line the pathways. A concrete jetty has been built out from the shore and, at the end of it, a landing stage lies upon two float ing pontoons. White buoys mark the mooring positions for the Clippers; and, in the night, red buoys, equipped with

electric lights, show the pilot the way.

PAA’s staff at Noumea, apart from the “Southern Seas”, consists of 4 Americans. 15 French assistants and 5 native labourers.

LOCAL contractors erected the main buildings, but a good deal of addi tional work has been done by the PAA staff. The water supply comes from two sources. Water for drinking purposes is brought from Noumea: but water for

toilet, the flowers and lawns is pumped from a well by probably the only electric water-pump in New Caledonia. There was no electric light or telephone service on He Nou before the advent of the Ameri cans, who, incidentally, had to pay for the electric light poles, wires, etc., used in bringing the two services from the mainland —as well as rental. In case of interruption in the Noumea supply, PAA has installed a diesel plant of its own.

The workshop at Nouville is a dupli cate, on a smaller scale, of what the modern American aviation workshop looks like to-day. A spare engine is kept here so that, at a moment's notice, one

Key To Photographs

TOP:—Nouville: PAA’s base is at left, near the white administrative building. On the right is the Government weather bureau station.

SECOND: —Landing jetty where passengers dis embark from Clippers.

THIRD: —Sign-board at end of jetty. It reads: “Noumea, Nouvelle-Caledonie. Latitude, 24 deg. 16 min. South; longitude, 166 deg. 25 min. East.

To Auckland, N.Z., 1,125 miles. To Canton Island, 1,996 miles”.

FOURTH:—Some of PAA’s administrative build ings.

BOTTOM: —The luxury yacht, “Southern Seas”, with He Nou in the background.

of the four engines on a 42-tons Clipper may be dismantled and replaced.

An idea of the systematic way PAA runs its service can be gauged from the layout of these workshops. All spare parts right down to the smallest nuts and screws, are kept in uniform rows of boxes; each with a particular number marked clearly on the outside. For in stance, on one tab, we read; “36.4312.

Nut, screw machine, steel”. If you went into any PAA base, in any part of the world, and asked for No. 36.4312 you would be given a nut exactly the same as the one in Noumea under that number.

The contents of these boxes are indexed in a file and a strict watch is kept so that the contents never get below a fixed minimum.

Another feature of the base which em phasises the strict uniformity insisted upon by the Company is the colour scheme of the buildings. The builders are told by the head office in USA just what colours have to be used, and where. For

example, in the workshop at Noumea, a black band about one foot wide, runs around the bottom of the walls; then for a specified distance a grey colour is used; and this is followed by a narrow black line; then a silver colour is used for the rest of the wall and the roof. The same colour scheme is used in all PAA base buildings in every part of the world.

The Clipper from Canton Island usually arrives at Noumea from the east at dusk, continues westwards for several miles and then wheels and comes into the He Nou base (opposite Noumea) from the south-west. On alighting, the machine taxis across to the mooring buoys. A line is put aboard and the plane is pulled alongside the landing-stage, tail fore most, by hydraulic power.

The passengers walk ashore to the main building, where they undergo the customs, health and immigration formali ties. This completed, they walk out onto another jetty, and into a speed launch, which takes them to the “Southern

Seas”, the luxurious, residential yacht, moored midway between the base and Noumea.

On the journey southwards, to New Zealand, passengers usually spend the night on the yacht, and leave early the next morning. On the northwards trip, the Clipper arrives from Auckland about mid-day, and leaves the following morn ing, giving passengers an opportunity to see something of New Caledonia.

THE meteorological side of the PAA service is a fascinating study. At Nouville, local weather reports on visibility, temperature, types of cloud formations, velocity of winds, etc,, are issued every six hours, and transmitted to other stopping places on the run from San Francisco. These reports are compiled from information gathered from the base’s own observations; from informa tion made available by the New Cale donian weather bureau; and from reports issued twice daily by PAA bases in the New Hebrides and Loyalty Islands. A theodolite tower has been built at Nou ville, and gas-filled balloons are released at various intervals during the day. As they rise, their progress is watched and automatically recorded by a man at the theodolite. By this means the direction and force of the prevailing wind, at all heights, can be ascertained.

From a meteorological point of view, the flight from San Francisco to Auck land is divided into two parts: the sec tion from San Francisco to Canton Is land coming under the control of the Honolulu divisional weather officer; and the section from Canton Island to Auck land is the concern of the Auckland officer. All intermediate bases co-operate with these two main points, and each day both Auckland and Honolulu issue 4 forecasts, whether a plane is in the air or not.

Two and a half hours before a plane is due to leave Auckland, the meteorologi cal officer there issues a “special prelim inary flight-time analysis”, covering the flight from Auckland to Noumea, which meteorologically is divided into four zones.

These special reports then are issued every hour while "the plane is in flight, and give its crew all possible information concerning weather conditions at 1,000, 7,000 and 10,000 feet. The plane, in turn, sends positional reports to Auckland and Noumea every 30 minutes; and these re ports embody wind speeds, types and quantities of cloud formations encount ered. etc., in addition to information con cerning the plane’s progress. With the Auckland weather reports, and the plane’s and local weather reports, it is possible for officials at Noumea to gauge to a minute just when the plane will land.

In order to get his position, the navi gator of the present-day Clipper does not rely merely upon the bearings he gets from the sun and stars; but he checks these with his wireless. For in stance, if the navigator of a plane flying between Noumea and Canton Island wants to find his position by wireless he makes sure he is on the correct wireless line between Noumea and Canton Island.

He then wants to know just where on that line the plane is, so he makes dir ectional wireless contact with some station between those two points—for ex ample, Suva. He takes a line from Suva across the line from Noumea to Canton, and he knows that where the two lines intersect is the position of the plane Along the route from Honolulu to Auckland, PAA has surveyed sites for use as emergency landing grounds Norfolk Island is among those selected; and in case Noumea Harbour suddenly should become unsuitable for a landing while a

plane is in flight, emergency alighting

places have been provided along the New Caledonian coast and in the New Hebrides.

ONE of the first obstacles encountered at Noumea, when the regular pas senger service was commenced, was the lack of suitable accommodation for the travellers’ overnight stay. Honolulu and Auckland have several first-class hotels, and the problem at Canton Is land was solved by building a modern hotel; but none of the Noumea hotel proprietors made any effort to improve their services to meet the high standards required by PAA. It was reported that as a result of this the Company tried to purchase a hotel and make the necessary alterations: and failing to do this, In spected a hill at the back of Noumea as a possible hotel site.

Finally, however, it was decided to use the luxuriously-equipped yacht “Southern Seas” as a floating hotel, and to-day this vessel is anchored behind Point Lambert —half-way between Nouville and Noumea —and is to be there “indefinitely”.

When Mr. C. T. J, Adamson, of the Public Service of Papua, discovered that his old friend and comrade in many hazardous patrols, Mr. Ivan Champion, had been rejected by the AIF on the eye sight test, Mr. Adamson managed to transfer from the AIF to the Navy. He is a qualified navigator. He passed his en trance examination satisfactorily and has entered the Australian Navy with com missioned rank. In order to be together, Messrs. Champion and Adamson were prepared to join the AIF as privates; but, when that arrangement was not possible, Mr. Adamson looked elsewhere.