Mystery of The Wailing

or standing by. Control tower back to CX4, wind, southeast, sailing, 12-foot air. All clear. Oh, hey, this is... Hop... Harragon. Honey, yes, it's America's ace of the Airways. Coming in for another transcribed episode in the Adventures of Hop Harragon.

Gang, there are several good reasons reasons why we won't be traveling in supersonic jet commercial transport planes in the very near future. According to Carl Baker, Chief Engineer of the Propeller Division of United Aircraft Corporation, speeds of passenger transports won't climb much above 450 to 500 miles an hour. First, because fuel consumption of jet planes is too high. Second, payload

would have to be reduced tremendously as compared with that of the present-day propeller-driven aircraft. So for these economic reasons alone, Baker thinks speeds will not be increased much above their present level for a long time to come.

That's the picture of jets versus propeller-driven planes on the scheduled airline front, but for armed services, the jets really will take over. Using this type of aircraft pose quite a problem for the men who design plane weapons and armament.

The extreme speed of the plane allows only a very short time for getting off a burst of bullets at a target, much less time than in conventional fighters, but last week the Air Force announced they had solved that problem.

Over 70,000 rounds were fired from guns on P-84 thunder jets. 75% of the rounds were fired while the planes were flying well over 600 miles an hour. Imagine! The problem of mounting armament also was solved.

As it looks like the Air Force is more than satisfied with the accomplishments of the P-84, while they've ordered another 550 thunder jets. In just a few minutes gang, I'll be back with more interesting information from around the Air Lane, so don't forget to listen!