Aeronautics: Sir Charles’s Nerves

Sir Charles’s Nerves

Off & on for the past four years Sir Charles Edward (“Smithy”) Kingsford-Smith, Australia’s air hero, has been making records between England and Australia. Last week he made a new one: 7 days, 5 hr. At Wyndham, western Australia, he dragged his weary frame from the cockpit of his small monoplane Miss Southern Cross, gave newshawks a gloomy account of as miserable a week as he ever spent. Said Sir Charles:

“I don’t like traveling over the sea with one engine. One hears all sorts of knocks and splutters, but . . . the engine and plane behaved perfectly. On the Persian Gulf I went to pieces and had to put in a day in bed. At one stage over the Timor

Sea I felt I would have to break out of the cabin. I suppose doctors would call it aquaphobia. I’m a bundle of nerves. I guess I’m getting too old for these stunts.” [He is 36.] Ill when he took off from Lympne, Eng land, Sir Charles suffered from lack of sleep. Typical excerpts from his log : ‘Feel pretty sick. Had worst scare when forced to descend to 200 feet be cause I thought I was fainting. . . . Pos-sibly [tailwinds] are blowing higher up but am afraid to go up lest, feeling suddenly faint, I might be unable to reach the ground before passing out. . . .”