First Trans-Pacific Flight Was

Made 21 Years Ago

IT is almost exactly 21 years since those wizards of the air, Sir Charles Kings ford Smith and C. T. P. Ulm, made the first Trans-Pacific flight (San Fran cisco to Brisbane —June, 1928) and the first Trans-Tasman flight (Sydney to Christchurch, on September 11, 1928). (See also page 89, this issue). Later, the two great Australian airmen (Kingsford Smith and Ulm) were lost, on different occasions, when attempting other pioneer flights.

That excellent New Zealand magazine, White’s Aviation, thus describes the first Trans-Pacific crossing:— The Southern Cross left Oakland and flew out over the Pacific at between 70 and 80 knots. To-day the speed is in the region of 300 m.p.h. There was monotony in the sea below and the blue sky above. After flying for nine hours they had covered 700 miles and still had 1,390 to go. Darkness set in and another day broke. At last the pioneer airmen saw a landmark at their first destina tion. They passed over Honolulu and landed at Wheeler Field. After flying for 275 hours they had successfully covered 2,400 miles nonstop.

The next leg, from Hawaii to Fiji, rep resented what was then the longest ocean flight ever attempted. The distance was 3,138 miles.

The Southern Cross was flown from Wheeler Field to Barking Sands some 90 miles away to be refuelled for the take off. The beach was cleared to make a runway 4,500 feet long and a load of 1,300 gallons of petrol was taken aboard. The take-off was set for 5.20 a.m. and every thing depended on the accuracy of navi gation for, as Kingsford Smith com mented, “We were making a long shot at a dot on the map and that dot was over 3,000 miles away.”

EARLY in the flight Ulm saw a trickle of liquid running from the wing tank and he nudged Smith. But, it was not petrol, only water formed by the condensation of air around the cold petrol pipe. That incident remained in their memories for some time.

Smith then records that he was worried by the clouds ahead and that worry was justified because they passed through thunderstorm after thunderstorm.

A motor coughed and spluttered. That gave them another shock, but it started a steady roar again and gave no further trouble for the rest of the trip.

Daylight began to wane and the air craft was put into a climb for night flying. Higher flying was safer at night and moreover there was a possibility of keeping above stormy clouds. Smith also wrote: “By climbing, we prolonged the day, for the higher we went the longer we kept the sun’s rays in view.”

After being 32 hours in the air the airmen picked from the feel of the tropi cal air that they were drawing close to Fiji and they began to look for land. Ulm, who at that time was at the controls, was the first to spot land on the hori zon, so to check where they were they went down to 20 feet to allow the navi gator to obtain a sight. While he was doing that another look for the land showed that it had disappeared. That was uncanny, but the fact was that they had simply lost sight of it through losing altitude —the curvature of the earth had played a trick on them.

WHEN nearing Suva, Kingsford Smith began to think about Albert Park, the only suitable snot for a landing.

He had never seen it before. He had been advised that the longest runway would

be only 400 yards and the landing would require good airmanship. That was not so easy after 34 hours in the air.

But he successfully put the old Fokker down on the Suva sports ground and completed the longest nonstop ocean flight on record at that time, a distance of 3,138 miles in 345 hours.

The Southern Cross was flown to an other beach to take off on the last leg of the epic flight. Brisbane was 1,700 miles away. Soon after take-off, their most important compass refused to work and once again they flew into storms. It was blind flying with a vengeance. Dawn brought an improvement. Finally, how ever, they saw land and they found that they had been driven 110 miles south of their course by the storm. They flew up the coast to Brisbane and completed the first crossing of the Pacific by air.