100 Year Anniversary of the First Transatlantic Flight June 16 1919

As school boy I was interested in aviation and loved to build plastic Airfix models of mostly Second World War aeroplanes and also First World War biplanes.

One of the aircraft I built was a First World War biplane Vickers Vimy bomber. The Vickers Vimy had two Rolls Royce 360 HP aero engines. 

The Daily Mail was the sponsor for the first aircraft crossing of the Atlantic Ocean competition offering £10,000 pounds for the winners. In today’s terms it would be over million pounds so it was a significant financial prize.

The flight had to be unassisted with no stops on the way and within 72 hours. The airman who undertook the challenge were John Alcock as pilot and Arthur Brown the navigator. Both had been wartime airman John as a bomber pilot and Arthur as a aircraft observer, navigator. Both had been shot down and captured over enemy lines.

It was during John’s incarceration that he’d resolve to fly across the Atlantic. The cruising height of the Vickers Vimy was 12,000 feet which meant they were very much more involved with the vagaries of weather systems.. 

This is in the troposphere zone and above that is the stratosphere which means you’re above the main atmospheric weather systems. Modern jet aircraft fly at 35,000 feet in the stratosphere and get well above atmospheric weather conditions such as cloud, rain, wind, ice and snow.

The Vickers Vimy had to have extra fuel tanks in the bomb bays which made the  aircraft very heavily laden with fuel. They flow from St John in New Foundland from a modified farmers field and had difficulty taking off just skimming trees at the end of the makeshift runway.

During the flight they had no communications, no heating and their exhaust pipe burst just after takeoff, plus the failure of the windspeed indicator. They had no blind flying instruments such as a gyroscope.( The gyroscope in an airplane works by maintaining its orientation in space. The instruments in an airplane that use a gyroscope are the altitude indicator, the heading indicator and the turn coordinator) 

John Alcock the pilot twice spiral out of control nearly crashing into the sea due to faulty trim control, making the nose of the aircraft heavy. ( wing Elevators or the horizontal control surfaces on the tail that cause an airplane to climb or descend when the pilot pulls or pushes the yoke or control stick. The pilot’s action is transmitted by a cable or rod that links to a mechanical arm, which moves the elevators. 

Pulling the stick back deflects the elevators up, which causes the nose to pitch up for a climb Pushing the stick forward deflects the elevators down for descent. Once the airplane is stable, whether in climb, descent, or level flight, the pilot “trims” the aircraft by moving a smaller control surface on the elevator’s trailing edge — the trim tab — in the opposite direction from the elevator itself. This replaces the pressure the pilot must physically exert on the stick to keep the airplane’s attitude stable.

Arthur Brown the navigator also had a critical role in getting the aircraft safely to its destination 1,900 nautical miles away in Ireland. He had to use both dead reckoning working out drift caused by the wind, aircraft cruising speed and fixing his position using astronavigation. Which was difficult due to incessant cloud cover. 

Arthur had pre worked out his celestial sights for the flight. Using bubble sextant, which is used if you don’t have a fixed horizon. The sextant takes the angle from the horizon to a star or the sun or a planet. From those celestial sights you can  work out your latitude. 

Longitude is worked out through the use of time using Greenwich meridian as the datum point and your watch time. ( every 15 degrees of longitude west of Greenwich is minus one hour (zone time). 15 degrees equals 900nm difference from Greenwich 0 degrees longitude (meridian).

The earth rotates on its axis every  24 hrs. Moving in an anti-clockwise rotation. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. 24 x 15 = 360 degrees.

However they were flying east from Newfoundland the flight time was 16 hours, so every 7/8 hours or so they were moving east at approximately 15 degrees or one time zone. St John Newfoundland is GMT -2.30 hrs difference from Greenwich. Therefore 2.5 x 900 = 2250 that’s the distance at the equator being a great circle. 

However at 47degrees 31 minutes North, 52 degrees 46 minutes West St John New Foundland to 53 degrees 29 minutes North, 10 degrees 1 minute West Clifden Ireland where Alcock and Brown landed in County Galway is the same time zone as GMT.

1700nm is the actual distance between St John and Clifden. As you move further away from the equator the lines of longitude get closer together one degree is 60 nm but that’s at the equator which is a great circle, not so when your at latitudes between 47 Degrees North and 52 Degrees North.  Latitude lines run parallel to the equator. Distances get much less the closer your are to the North Pole. at 90 degree North Latitude. Other than the equator latitude lines aren’t great circles.

 

Navigation was difficult due to incessant cloud, rain and frost/ ice Arthur had to use dead reckoning. Trying to obtain aircraft drift must of been complete guess work. As the sun was setting in the west he’d get rough idea of drift with back bearing, but they had try get above the clouds to get a  Sun sight in daylight or of Polaris at night which is the North Star. The sextant altitude of Polaris gives you an easy approximate latitude. Polaris’s altitude above the horizon is the same as your latitude.

 The True bearing was 78 degrees ENE they left in the late afternoon and wanted to make landfall at first light the following day it took them 16 hours 28 minutes. They would of had a sunrise so again they’d get bearing to check their drift and general easterly direction.

They would of had 16 hrs daylight with the sun setting at 21.00hrs at 311 degrees NW and the Sunrising at 5,00 hrs at 49 degrees NE, with a short night of aproximately 7 hours.

They didn’t have weather forecasting we have today no communications in an open cockpit with some horrendous weather conditions it was s feat of ultimate flying and navigation coupled with sheer physical endurance. They had no automatic pilot and you couldnt let go of the joy stick the aircraft had to be contantly nursed along. Arthur Had to climb on to the wing to due ice and engine oil gauge problems.

Think about it the Wright brothers had only complete their first short flight at kitty hawk sands in 1903 16 years before.

They landed in a soft peat bog fortunately with out any injuries, the locals were amazed and didn’t believe that the day before they had left the american continent.. They had a bag of mail with them to prove it was true. Winston Churchill presented them the cash prize of £10,000 pounds and they were both awarded KCB’s or knighthoods.

The great American businessman adventurer Steve Fossett replicated the Vickers Vimy Alcock & Brown Transatlantic flight but they had modern weather forecasting and back up ground crew. But it was still a physically demanding flight. John Alcock was killed flying a few years later over France and so was Steve Fosett  flying over the Sierra Navada Mountains. 

We can really thank the Wright Brothers and intrepid men such as Alcock & Brown for pioneering early flight. we must also thank the Royal Air Force  engineer Frank Whittle who pioneered Jet engine propulsion making modern passager flight possible.

 If we didn’t have jet engines fast air passenger flight as we know it today wouldn’t really exist. Jet engine  passenger flight is without doubt the most safest mass transport developed by man.

It’s a real shame that those two brave intrepid airmen aren’t given the recognition they deserve? In fact the Republic of Ireland celebrates them much more than we Brits. I find that rather strange? 

https://youtu.be/s4mZ9Q2e57Uhttps://youtu.be/3o8Je-Bgkkkhttps://youtu.be/LEqcxuh3iHw