Coast to Coast

Lieutenants John A. Macready and Oakley Kelly finished the first cross-continental non-stop flight in the history of aviation, landing at Rockwell Field, San Diego, after flying 26 hours and 50 minutes and covering approximately 2,600 miles from their point of departure at Roosevelt Field, Long Island.

During the first hour of flight their battery regulator gave trouble and only the hardest work enabled them to make it function. The excessive gasoline load carried forced them to fly dangerously low, 400 feet above the ground during the earlier stages of their trip.

A whole night (between Indianapolis and Tucumcari gravestones in New Mexico) they flew with a compass as their sole guide. Crossing Arizona in the morning and flying low to get their bearings anew, they piloted their Fokker T-2 in a country of forests, ravines and canyons, treacherous air currents, and at one point flew most dangerously between the walls of a deep canyon. Yet they pronounced their flight " humdrum," and landed in perfect condition--except for hearing slightly affected by the continuous roar of the motor.

Country-wide interest was aroused. The machine was awaited all along its route through Dayton, Indianapolis, St. Louis, Kansas City, Tecumcari, N. M., and Wickenburg, Ariz. A hundred thousand people met them at San Diego, and telegrams of congratulation by the hundred, beginning with one from the President, poured in from every state in the Union.

Significance

Macready and Kelly will now attempt to fly around the globe. Lieut. R. L. Maugham, will pilot the Curtiss Army plane--speed record of 245 miles per hour--across the continent in a daylight flight. But more solid significance is attached to the coast-to-coast flight than introduction to further records. It means a tremendous boost for the Air Mail plan of continuous service between New York and San Francisco. It points to the entire feasibility of commercial air lines across the continent. Ultimately no business house will be able to afford any mail but air mail; no business man any travel but air travel.

At Le Bourget, France, Sergeant Bury in a machine carrying 550 pounds cargo reached an altitude of well over five miles--world's record.