GLIDING DEMONSTRATIONS AT BLACKPOOL |
While the Blackpool & Fylde Gliding Club were still without a glider a new manufacturer (British Aircraft Company) was publicising their products by giving demonstrations of car towing all over the country. The club secretary invited them to Blackpool. Lowe-Wylde brought a BAC 6 solo glider, The car was a Bentley, and the flying weekend was on 14 - 15 March 1931. When the local paper announced this they drew attention to a fatal accident four days earlier, in Herts, when a Thomas Lander had stalled from the launch and dived steeply to earth. In fact Lander had been trying the first winch launch ever, and thought that the surge from "all out" would be eased if he fitted a length of elastic rope between the cable and the glider. The driver let in the clutch and the glider was shot forwards, presumably to disorientate the pilot, who climbed steeply, stalled and dived steeply into the ground. However Lowe-Wylde was exactly the BGA committee member who would have been vetting such experiments, and certainly his own car-launching system was not discredited. The flying was done on Stanley Park aerodrome, now the zoo and the picture printed in the paper shows the BAC 6 glider climbing steeply at roof height against a hangar with a rounded roof. The zoo offices occupy a building carrying the control tower cupola, and the relevant hangar is the one most inland from here, still visible in 1998. With 250 yards of wire Lowe-Wylde reached 500 to 700 feet, and completed full circuits. A power pilot showed interest, was given a briefing and then short hops in the solo glider. He wrote a letter to Sailplane & Glider full of enthusiasm and perhaps surprise. Several other gliding clubs sent observers, Furness (Barrow), Preston ; eight members arrived from Manchester (Royal Aero. Soc./ Lancs. Aero Club) in four power planes. Furness took some cine film ; if only that could be unearthed......... Further gliding demonstrations took place on Wednesday 8th July 1931 at the Blackpool Air Pageant. Robert Kronfeld was the star attraction with his Wien glider (strutted wings of 19 metre span, about Olympia performance). He had recently made a thermal soaring flight of 65 km. from Hanworth (near Heathrow) drifting across Central London for four hours to land at Chatham. He was billed to repeat this feat around Blackpool....... In the event "despite the strong wind he was towed up to 800 or 900 feet and glided smoothly and evenly past underneath the clouds around the aerodrome". That sounds more like Blackpool weather ! Krause flew the Lyons Tea Falke, and Edward Mole a BAC 7 two seater, owned by Barbara Cartland. Launches were by aerotow, just developed to give them 10,000 feet for gliding flights across the English Channel. The Cirrus Moth tug was flown by Geoffrey Tyson, who towed the BAC 7 up from London with a pit stop at Birmingham. They landed by mistake at Squires Gate, took off again for Stanley Park and released the glider. The trailing rope then struck the wing of a parked aircraft while the Moth was approaching to land. Tuesday 7th July 1931 !!! During the barnstorming days, Sir Alan Cobham's team visited Preston, Lancaster, Blackpool and Fleetwood between 23 & 28 June 1932, during their first year of operation. Lowe-Wylde joined the team to demonstrate car-tow launches, and when they came again on Monday 5th September 1932 his pilot C.J.Longmore was to perform his party trick, to loop the BAC 7 two-seater from a car-tow to 400 feet........Michael Maufe rebuilt one at Ilkley, and it is now for sale. Any takers ? They certainly came again in September 1935, when they flew from Birks Farm, Ballam, behind Lytham. Joan Meakin flew her glider, presumably the Rhonbussard, in an aerobatic routine. I once saw and admired this glider, near Chester, and asked if it was going to fly. Their excuse was that it was either too calm or too windy, I forget which. Even at the tender age of eight or ten I knew that this was rubbish, it was a lovely day !
SOURCES. West Lancashire Evening Gazette 12, 14, 16 March 1931 |