| The
Aviator
Wind, weather and clouds are the
elements that an aviator must deal with. Man’s ambition to take to the
air like the birds in the sky is as old as mankind itself. With the many
kinds of aircraft that exist today, man’s dreams have been fulfilled.
We have hot-air balloons as well as helium- filled airships, and of
course, passenger airliners and wonderful sport flier-planes.
The rapid development of air-travel is
truly remarkable: 1901 = the airship Graf Zeppelin, 1913 = the Brothers
Wright, 1928 = Lindberg’s first transatlantic flight, 1939 the first
turbo-jet propelled motor (HE 178), 1941 = the first rocket flight (ME
163), 1954 = the establishment of the Atlantic passengers airlines, and
then in rapid succession, squadrons of modern passenger jet planes from
America as well as from Russia. Even the Europeans are into it again
with the development of spacious aircraft that are especially quiet and
extremely economical in conserving fuel. For all airborne pursuits, be
they behalf of an avocation or of an occupation, we need the services of
an enthusiastic and dutiful aviator; or a pilot, or a flight-captain.
Like an organist, he has a profusion of buttons and controls, of
switches and levers that he must operate with his hands and feet.
Signal-beacons flicker in unison with the radar screen. But we sit in
airplanes in comfortable seats, above us the radiant blue skies and
below us the white clouds, that look like giant whipped-cream mountains. |
