โ Scribed by R.H.O.
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Vol. XXVI, No. I43.)
Fighter airplanes employing jet-propulsion engines soon will be in production, having passed experimental tests successfully.
Jet-propulsion engines were originally of British design. Work was started on these engines in Great Britain in I933 by Group Captain Frank Whittle. Full information about the engine was described in July I94I to the United States Army Air Forces who at once asked for an engine to be sent to the U. S. A., and the engine which had made the first flight was sent to the General Electric Company in September I94I.
The first of these engines was ready for test in less than six months. At the same time the Bell Aircraft Company was given an order to build an aircraft suitable to operate with two of these engines, and the first flight in the United States was made in less than twelve months. Several hundred successful flights have been carried out since then by American pilots in the United States and by British pilots with British aircraft in England, many of them at high altitudes and with extreme speed and all without a single mishap.
The plane is still without an official public designation, but during the years of development it has been known variously as "Putt-Putt," "Squirt," "Hush-Hush," "Siberia," and "Super-Secret."
The prime difference in the outward appearance of the jet-propulsion plane in contrast with others is that it does not have a propeller. Once, when the plane was transported by truck from one testing site to another, a dummy wooden propeller was attached, successfully cloaking its identity. R. H. O.
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