AERONAUTICS: New Records

World’s records for distance and endurance were set when the French dirigible Dixmude soared uninterruptedly for 118 hrs., 41 min. over 4,500 miles of Africa, Europe and the Mediterranean. The distance: from San Francisco to New York and half way back; from Boston to Southampton and thence to Gibraltar.

On her lofty way back from a two-day cruise over the Sahara, the Dixmude met a hurricane above Sardinia—so circled back to the African coast. Next day Sardinia and Corsica passed beneath her. At seven the following morning she hovered over Paris, then dropped a wreath on the monument at Moulins to the victims of the dirigible Republique’s crash some years ago, swung back to the Riviera and landed in front of her hangar near Marseilles at the dawn of her fifth day of flight.

Commander McCrary of the gigantic new ZR1, U. S. Navy, about to take a test run from Lakehurst, N. J., to St. Louis, was much impressed by the Dixmude’s performance.