Airmen Who Make £500 a Week

AIRMEN WHO MAKE £500 A WEEK
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Thrills and Perils of Testing New Machines.

    Big fortunes have been made by the airmen who test new aeroplanes. There have been instances where a single aviator has drawn a cheque for £500 for a week's work.
    It is seldom that these highly trained men get less than £100 a week, for they usually receive £25 for every trial trip they make. They are retained and paid by private firms on Government contracts and from the nature of the risks they run their reward is not extravagant.
    Every time they go up in a new machine—even though it has passed the severe factory tests—the expert fliers take their lives in their hands, and more than one has come to grief owing to some structural defect in the machine that could not be detected until the strain of flying brought it to light.
    One famous aviator employed on this work had an amazing escape the other day, and he owes his life a little to luck and much to his own coolness and daring.
    He was in a machine fresh from the factory, flying at a height of nearly 12,000 ft. When preparing to loop the loop he tried the tail controls and to his horror found they had jammed.
    If he had made this discovery a few minutes later his life would have been past saving. As it was, he could not descend in the normal manner by planing down; he could only continue to climb.
    "I had no desire to join the 'man in the moon,'" he afterwards explained, "nor attempt the altitude record without being able to get down to earth again, so I cut off the engines and fluttered down to the ground, falling almost like a stone. When a little distance from the landing-place I restarted the engines to break the shock, and the machine eventually landed without a scratch. But after this I shan't be so long before I test the tail control.
    "It is a most strenuous task testing these machines, for we have to do all the fancy tricks and manoeuvres that our airmen do flying over the German lines or in combat with the enemy. Any weaknesses there may be in the construction of the machines must be found before they are passed for active service.
    "The Flying Corps men take enough risks without having defective machines thrust on them—and that is why we do all the freak flying that the public once paid their shillings to watch and now witness for nothing."

The Weekly Dispatch - Sunday, September 16, 1917