"Mothers" for Airplanes at Sea 



How the Atlantic Ocean or the war zones 

 can be protected with relays of seaplanes 



By A. L. Aldey 



/%ERIAL convoys for transports and 

 /A merchant vessels crossing the high 

 seas, aerial protection for harbors, 

 aerial raiding bases for sea attacks, and 

 transoceanic aerial patrol service — by 

 these uses of air-craft might perhaps be 

 given the vital blow to the German sub- 

 marine. 



Why not, though, airplane bases at sea? 

 And if at sea, why not all the way across 

 the Atlantic? Why not airplane stations 

 in and near harbors, where the craft can 

 be despatched, received, overhauled, and 

 refitted? Why not, in other words, not 

 only a maximum of aerial coast defense 

 but an open sea lane, patrolled day and 

 night by planes? 



Such a cross-sea lane is not as yet 

 needed, perhaps. But the lane could be 

 extended from English and continental 

 shores as far as required to give ample 

 protection within the operating zone of 

 the German submarines. 



What I propose here is the adaptation 

 of a German idea — that of the "mother 

 ship" f or submersibles — to the airplane, at 

 the same time retaining the protective and 

 repair value for submarines and destroyers 

 embodied in the Teuton ship; with the 

 further expansion of the use of these 

 double vessels on the open sea where they 

 can be utilized as starting and receiving 

 points for aerial patrols, for light ships, 

 for relay wireless stations, for defense 

 points against torpedo raids. 



Take then, by way of summary of this 

 plan, two separate hulls, so connected by 

 superstructure as to form one boat with 

 two bottoms. Two sets of engines and 

 double rudders would provide for the 

 handling of this double-hull ship. 



The superstructure above these hulls 

 may be most briefly described as a "plat- 

 form," a deck of extreme width and 

 length, from which air craft could be 

 launched and, in some instances, received. 



Between the hulls is a natural harbor, 

 the water of which is made calm by the 

 lowering of end gates to keep out the 



waves. From beneath the upper "plat- 

 form," or deck, hangs a false deck which 

 may be lowered into the water. This 

 lowered deck and the end gates form, 

 with the hulls, a huge tank into which 

 hydro-airplanes can descend, and by 

 means of which they may be elevated to 

 the upper deck for overhauling. Simi- 

 larly submersibles, destroyers, and small 

 water craft can be driven into this pro- 

 tective space and taken out of water for 

 repairs and scraping. 



The stationing of such "mother ships" 

 at intervals of, say, a hundred miles all the 

 way across the Atlantic would provide an 

 open lane for transports and merchant- 

 men. One hundred miles an hour may 

 be given as an average speed, all weathers 

 and models considered, for an airplane. 

 These stations, then, would be but an 

 hour apart by air route. At no time would 

 any airplane patrolling from one station 

 to another be more than half an hour's 

 ride from another. 



Constant patrolling by aerial routes 

 from one station to another would keep 

 the sea clear of under-water raiders. 

 Communication would be so rapid, dis- 

 cernment so easy, that the submarine 

 would be less deadly than it has proven to 

 be. The air could be kept filled with the 

 flying scouts, passing from station to sta- 

 tion, one hundred miles and return, with 

 communication maintained by wireless, 

 not only between airplane and floating 

 harbor, but between the stations them- 

 selves. 



Once a periscope has been sighted any- 

 where within radius of the sea lane, 

 general knowledge of it is known; and 

 from the "mother ships" debouch a fleet 

 of destroyers. 



For the protection of the "mother 

 ships" torpedo nets would be provided. 

 Besides there are the accompanying de- 

 stroyers, the "mother ship's" own heavy 

 artillery and munitions. It would be a 

 rash submersible navigator who would in- 

 vade the precincts of such a lane. 



:>*)() 



