4000 ft. More than three tons of us hurtling through the air. We are in the storm now. 3 tons is shaken considerably. * * * * People are so likely to think of planes as frail craft that I draw attention to this entry. Friendship weighs 6000 pounds empty, and on the flight she carried about her own weight again. * * * * _Log Book:_ Bill is nosing her down, all motors wide. We are bucking a head wind and rain. Heaviest storm I have ever been in, in the air, and had to go through. The sea below looks fairly placid, but of course the surface appears flat from 3000. * * * * A surprising element of flying, at first, is the flatness of the earth’s contours as seen from above—even sizeable hills dwarf. This tendency gives one a feeling of security and a comfortable belief that a safe landing can be made almost anywhere. “The higher the safer” is a good adage. The air itself isn’t dangerous, as I have said before. The greater the altitude, the larger the pilot’s choice in picking and being able to reach a landing field in an emergency. Don’t ask a pilot to stay close to the ground, unless he is flying over geographical billiard tables. * * * * _Log Book:_ I see some clear sea ahead and the air is getting bumpy, as one would expect between areas of cloud and sun. Slim comes back to say snow is in the air. I know it. I have just come back from sitting up front. Slim at the controls with Bill advising him. Bill has homing pigeon sense of direction.... He tells Slim to keep at 106. We have been out of snow a long while now and the sun is shining and the water blue as far as one can see. There are some clouds ahead—what, I don’t know. They look high and white. * * * * Those clouds ahead continued from there on. Not again on the flight did we see the ocean. Skippy was right—it was no sea voyage. * * * * _Log Book:_ 140 m.p.h. now. Wonderful time. Temp. 52. The heater from cockpit warms the cabin too. Bill says radio is cuckoo. He is calling now. There is so much to write. I wonder whether ol’ diary will hold out. I see clouds coming. They lie on the horizon like a long shore line. I have just uncurled from lying on Major Woolley’s suit for half an hour. I came off this morn with such a headache that I could hardly see. I thought if I put it to sleep it might get lost in the billows of fog we are flying over. There is nothing to see but churned mist, very white in the afternoon sun. I can’t see an end to it. 3600 ft. temp. 52, 45 degrees outside. I have et a orange, one of the originals. At T. our infrequent oranges came from Spain, under-nourished little bloods. * * * *