i6 
LAISU & WATER 
September 7, 1916 
above the bonnet, over the petrol tank, and tiring for- 
ward through the circle swept by the .propeller blades. 
(Jn one of the blades is shown a patch of armour steel 
arranged to deflect the chance bullets which fail to pass 
between the blades. [I notice that the photograph from 
which the sketch was made has lent tcj it a very ex- 
aggerated perspective and caused the near wing to look 
much larger than the far ones. This must be forgiven me 
since it has no importance in relation to the explanatory 
character of the sketch in (]uestion.j Sometimes the 
patch of armour is omitted altogether from the propellor 
and the same security is got by timing the trigger action 
of the gun to (ire only in the interspace between the blades 
Defender type of aeroplane shown with one wing removed and part 
of body cut away to show footbar connected to the rudder by chain 
line and control column or " joy stick " in the airman's hand with 
wire to the aileron. This same stick is connected by a wire not 
shown to the elevator situated behind the tail plane 
in accordance with a suggestion believed to have been 
made by Mr. C. Gray in iqi2 or earlier, and used by the 
Germans, the French, and ourselves only since the war. 
Zepp Attacks by Day and Night 
The difficulties about bagging " Zepps" b\' day arc 
(i) they can, for all their size, climb abominably 
fast; (2) they have so many folks on board that their 
lookout in the air is many times more effective than that 
of any one, two, or say six aeroplanes, also supposed in 
the air, but unable tb discuss the looking out business 
with one another : (3) Zepps are, strange as it may 
seem, extraordinarily hard to find from an aeroplane : 
(4) if the Zepp finds the aeroplanes first, its eminently' 
great air endurance enables it to take refuge over the 
sea ; since any known aeroplane light enough to climb 
quickly over it cannot be carrying many hours' fuel, and 
must retain such a stock in hand as to be able to Ry back 
to land after the assault. 
From the last condition it will be seen that an ordinary 
"defender" with three hours' fuel, say, would have to 
do the whole of the " catching up " in ih hours, including 
a prodigiously fast chmb to some 13,00b feet. There 
have been two cases, justly celebrated, when Zepps have 
been bombed by British airmen, the one by day, and the 
other by night— the one on a French aeroplane, the 
other on a British. The ditficulties of attack on a Zepp 
by night are of a different order in some respects. 
If the chase takes place in the dark, and lasts say, two 
hours, of 100 miles, the aeroplane pilot will be that 
distance from his illuminated landing ground. It is the 
merest chance if any other landing ground is handy, is 
known to him, and is illuminated. It would be fatal to 
illuminate every probable aerodrome on his track ; it 
would amount to warning the Zeppelin where not to go. 
.\ccordingly the safe re-alighting of the aeroplane is a 
dominant consideration by night — if aeroplane attacks 
on Zepps are to be made by night in present circum- 
stances 'which I seriously doubt, in spite of the very 
vocal Mayors — stout fellows — who always write to the 
papers after a Zepp raid. They seem to feel that they 
pay for flyers and ought to get value.] By night, the 
rigid airsliiji covers up its ostensible defect of being a 
large garget and retains all its manifest advantages of 
long range, rapid rising, multiplicity of engines, its 
buoyancy independent of engines save it from dependence 
on the source of power ; its numerous guns in defence, 
its organised look-outs, its ability (o go dead slow, to 
drift silently down wind ; and it retains above all, in a 
superior degree at night, its quality of being practically 
as hard to find from an aeroplane as is another aeroplane. 
Lieut. Warneford's Feat 
By day the most successful aeroplane for Zepp attach 
is the light, fast " defender," since its high alighting speef 
introduces no additional risk beyond that normal ti 
alighting on such machines. A mcncplane should b 
specially useful for tinding the quarry, the nionoplanj 
having the (juality of a free view of all the sky above tin 
pilot. The only competitor for freedom of view is th< 
" pusher "—time may show which is the more useful as 
experience is gained, but at present it is to a Morane 
single seater with rapid engine that we owe our first 
Zeppelin bag by day, and there is no stronger proof of 
utility than actual achievement. For this Lieut. Warneford 
was decorated with a V.C, to his lasting fame and honour. 
Lieut. Brandon's Feat 
By night, the most successful aeroplane proved to be — 
what might have been expected — an aeroplane of excep- 
tionally slow alighting quality and of great strength, 
thereby giving to the airman that confidence in his 
eventual landing which freed him to leave the immediate 
neighbourhood of his aerodrome to career off into the 
blackness at <),ooo feet height after the airship, and take his 
chance of alighting where fortune might lead him. In this 
case the aeroplane was a two seater, a " BE2C " relieved 
of the weight of the passenger, and to that extent still 
better for slow ahghting, it was a typical " multi-pur- 
pose "aeroplane, and as I have something to say against 
" multi-purpose" aeroplanes on principle, I am" only too 
glad to admit that they have their good points, and "have 
in fact, the only Zepp bagged by night to their credit, 
besides being the only British aeroplane to have brought 
down an airship raider at all. Lieut. Brandon gained 
the D.S.O. for this feat. 
Aeroplane Nomenclature 
There is nothing more symptomatic of the progress of 
flight than the utter inadequacy of the names by which 
aeroplanes of various types are still known. They are 
worse than inadequate, they are inappropriate. I'or 
some years, at any rate since Col. Sykes's lecture on the 
subject before the Aeronautical Society, all single-seated 
aeroplanes were called, and were regarded, as " scouts." 
They were specifically called for by this military authority 
to Seoul, and their arming was scarcely considered. I do 
not blame him, on the contrary I note that no one in any 
land or clime, not even the stimulating critics of the 
R.F.C. suggested that he was mistaken. No one presaw 
that single seaters would mainly be used for purposes 
other than fast scouting, and that all aeroplanes must be 
armed. The term " scout " as distinctive of the single 
seater survives, but is doomed. The absurdity of calUng 
a " bomber " a " scout," is sufficiently evident, and the 
term " fighter scout " is almost comic. 
The business of bombing, though entertAined by the 
Naval Service, was little regarded by the army at the 
beginning of the war. In neither service was any sub- 
stantial provision made for bombing as a definite branch 
of operation. If we are to believe each of the com- 
batant armies' accounts of the other's bombing (and 
it is the country in receipt of the bombs which best 
knows what their military effect is), we may conclude 
that in relation to the expenditure, the effect is in- 
significant. Bombing is like artillery fire without " fire 
control " or." spotting " ; the aim is worse, the weight 
of metal thrown is less, the expense of throwing it is 
greater, and so is the risk. The quality which gives 
value to the bomber aeroplane is that its range of action 
IS greater than that of the guns. Intense study is being 
put into the aiming problem, and it may perhaps bear 
Its sinister fruit before long. The serious use to us is 
the attack on railways, centres and depots, just behind 
the lighting area, so as to hinder concentrations of troops 
and munitions, notably at the time of a " push." Its 
political use is that it gives the populace a degree of satis- 
faction and stimulation quite beyond what is warranted 
by results, accordingly when there is a lull, or when 
affairs have not moved as well as the authorities might 
have wished, bombing raids are resorted to and reported 
on the one hand, and disparaged on the other. 
