"We" : $b The famous flier's own story of his life and his trans-Atlantic flight, together with his views on the future of aviationLindbergh, Charles A. (Charles Augustus)
History
"We" : $b The famous flier's own story of his life and his trans-Atlantic flight, together with his views on the future of aviation
Lindbergh, Charles A. (Charles Augustus)
Aeronautics -- Flights; Air pilots -- Biography; Transatlantic flights
I climbed up to three thousand feet and started in to fulfill my
agreement by doing a few airsplashes, steep spirals and dives. With the
first deviation from straight flight my passenger had his head down on
the floor of the cockpit but continued to wave the red handkerchief
with one hand while he was holding on to everything available with the
other, although he was held in securely with the safety belt.
Finally, remembering my ground instructions, I leveled the plane off
and with wide open motor waited a few moments to pick up maximum
speed, then, slowly pulling back on the stick I began to loop. When I
had gotten one-fourth of the way around, the ship was trembling in a
nearly stalled position; still, the Curtiss motor was doing its best
and it was not until the nose was pointing directly skyward at a ninety
degree angle that the final inertia was lost and for an instant we hung
motionless in the perfect position for a whipstall. I kicked full right
rudder immediately to throw the plane over on its side but it was too
late, the controls had no effect.
The Negro meanwhile decided that the “flip flops” were over and poked
his head over the side of the cockpit looking for mother earth. At
that instant we whipped. The ship gathered speed as it slid backwards
towards the ground, the air caught the tail surfaces, jerked them
around past the heavier nose and we were in a vertical dive; again in
full control, but with no red handkerchief waving over the cockpit.
I tried another loop in the same manner but just before reaching the
stalling point in the next one I kicked the ship over on one wing and
evaded a whipstall. After the second failure I decided that there
must be something wrong with my method of looping and gave up any
further attempt for that afternoon. But it was not until we were almost
touching the ground that the bandanna again appeared above the cowling.
I remained in Maben for two weeks carrying over sixty passengers in all
or about three hundred dollars worth. People flocked in from all over
the surrounding country, some travelling for fifteen miles in oxcarts
just to see the plane fly.
One old negro woman came up and asked,--
“Boss! How much you all charge foah take me up to Heaben and leave me
dah?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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