United States or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
During the fighting before Verdun, eight French aviators, driving machines thus equipped, were ordered to attack eight German balloons. Six of the balloons were destroyed. But the very last word in aeronautical development is what might be called, for want of a better term, an aerial submarine. I refer to seaplanes carrying in clips beneath the fuselage specially constructed 18-inch torpedoes.
The binoculars of the Master and Bohannan drew the machine almost to fingers' touch. "Only one man aboard her, with a machine-gun," commented the Master, eyes at glass, as he watched the flick of sunlight on the attacker's fuselage, the dip and glitter of her varnished wings, the blur of her propellers. Already the roaring of her exhaust gusted down to them. "Ah, see? She's turning, now.
The transport ship seemed very large, standing on the concrete apron with its tricycle landing gear let down. It curiously resembled a misshapen insect, standing elaborately high on inadequate supporting legs. Its fuselage, in particular, did not look right for an aircraft. The top of the cargo section went smoothly back to the stabilizing fins, but the bottom did not taper.
The whole of the machine is lifted about a hundred feet by the compression from a shell that has exploded a few yards beneath our undercarriage. I begin to wonder whether all our troubles have been swept away by a direct hit; but an examination of the machine shows no damage beyond a couple of rents in the fabric of the fuselage. That finishes my observation work for the moment.
That same afternoon Captain Sutton, R. F. C., looking for an interest in life over Menin, found it. He came back with his fuselage shot to chips and wet through from a smashed radiator. "So far as I can discover," he said, "all the circuses are hovering about Menin. Von Bissing's is there and von Rheinhoff's, and I could almost swear I saw von Wentzl's red scouts." "Did you get over the town?"
By some inexplicable maneuver he managed to clamber on to the bottom of the fuselage of the machine, astride of which he sat as if he was riding a horse. Though the machine was out of control, owing to the loss of its tail planes, yet by moving forward and backward he so managed to balance it that it glided fairly steadily downward, although upside down.
You can lay down close to the fuselage and hang on to a brace. They've been doubting your nerve, I hear." He climbed in, pulling off his cap for Mary V to wear. "Reach down there on the right-hand side, Mary V, and get me those extra goggles. All right come on, Bland, let's show 'em something." Bland hesitated, plainly reluctant to try the stunt Johnny had suggested. But Johnny was urgent.
A three-deck craft, it was equipped with complete laboratory facilities for research in any corner of the globe. Jet lifters in the belly of the fuselage enabled the craft to take off vertically and also to hover. As Tom supervised the loading of the equipment, a foghorn voice boomed, "'Mornin', buckaroos!" The chunky figure of Chow Winkler came into view.
Could he but loosen the straps which bound him to the fuselage, could he but climb to that platform, he would at least be free for a time from the rude beating of the black waters which rolled over him incessantly. With the numbed, trembling fingers of one hand he struggled with the stubborn, water-soaked straps while with the other he clung to the rods of the rigging.
The pattering hail of slugs continued to zoon from the sand-hills, bombarding the vast-spread wings and immense fuselage of Nissr. For the most part, that bombardment was useless to the Beni Harb. A good many holes, opened up in the planes, and some broken glass, were about the Arabs' only reward. None of the bullets could penetrate the metal-work, unless making a direct hit.
Word Of The Day