Commercial AviationSource: The Scientific Monthly, Vol. 21, No. 5 (Nov., 1925), pp. 555-557Published by: American Association for the Advancement of ScienceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/7490 .

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11 10G E s %1J%%()Z! (11 IS C 1,Nc A, O 1) 2 ) )

. . .

THE TWO IIUND)REI)TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE RUSSIA-N ACADEMIY OF SCIENCES

PROFESSOR STEKLOFF', TIIE 1ATI-EAMATICAL Pl1YSICIST, VICE-PR1ESIDENT OF TIIE

ACADEMY, AVITII 1)1. C. A. RAMIAN, PROFESSOR OF PhlYSICS AT TIIE UNIVERSITY

OF CALCUTTA.

COMMERCIAL AVIATION

AB'OvT 30,000,000 miles havte been flown in regular commercial air service throughout the world, ae- cordiino to a progress report of the survey now b)eing ma(le jointly by the Uf. S. Department of Commerce and the Ameriean Engineering Council.

This distance has been covered under widely varving conditions, over land and water, forests and mountains, by day ancd night, it Awas said by Professor Joseph W. Roe, director of the field staff of the joint committee On civil aviation, ancd head of the Department of Induistiial Engineering in New York University, by wlhom the report Avas authorized.

This accumulated experience, according to Professor Roe, affords data for comparing the developmeint and present status of civil aviation in this country and in Europe, as to growth and chaiacter of service, safetv, re- liability, financial aspects, government relations, etc. It also gives infor- imation on the conditioins covering air transport, airways and the iindustrial use of airplanes as in agriculture, forestry and surveying.

Professor Roe favors a federal air law providing for government, supervision of air transport, and indirect aid to commercial aviation, not necessarilv in the form of subsidies.

The Department of Commerce and the American Engineering Council ale making a study of civil aviation and gathering data which will be of value as a basis for constructive legislation and for guiding investment in this field.

Information, supplied by foreign attaches, aviation officers, engineers aind operators is beingl bronght together covering all the regular air services

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5a6 THE SCIENTIF[C MlONTHLY

. ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ .. .. . ..

THE TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

PROFESSOR SERGIUS VON OLDENBURG, PERMANENT SECRETARY OF THE ACADEMY, WITH THE TIBETIAN SAVANT, HAMBO-A.LVAI-DAP.ULOV, REPRESENTATIVE OF THE

DALAI-LLAMA.

throughout the world. The study deals with the commercial operation of aircraft, as distinguished from manufacture, and will not touch on military or naval flying.

The report will cover also the world experience in governmental rela- tions with civil aviation. Every foreign air line is heavily subsidized. This does not necessarily mean that American air lines should have subsidies.

Conditions here are more favorable for commercial aviation than abroad, but it can not even hope to succeed without those indirect aids which have been extended to land and water transportation throughout our entire history.

Few realize the extent of such aid, which amounts to about $200,000,000 for the current fiscal year 1925-26 and covers such items as coast and hydrographic surveys, light- house service, weather bureau, river and harbor improvements and rural post roads.

The establishment of aids such as airways, beacons, airports, meteoro- logical and radio services is only applying to air transport the policy long

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THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE 557

followed with the older forms of transportation, and without which they could not operate.

A second phase is air legislation. We have as yet no federal air laws and no supervision of air transport. Any inexperienced pilot with any second-hand plane, who can induce a passenger to go into the air with him is free to do so, a condition unthinkable at sea.

There should be a federal air law placing air transport under such proper government supervision as will insure safety. It should be general in eharacter and flexible enough to allow adjustment to the ehanging con- ditions of a rapidly developing situation.

It should conform as far as possible to the International Convention for Air Navigation, which is the basis of the air laws of all countries. In Canada such a law has been in operation for five years and is giving general satisfaction.

The survey in hand is gathering the experience of other countries with their air laws to aid in the formulation of similar legislation in this country.

A complete report on the survey, the first of the kind to be attempted either in this country or abroad, will be presented to the Administrative Board of the American Engineering Council at a meeting fixed for October 293 and 30 at Columbus, Ohio.

The chairman of the committee on civil aviation is J. Walter Drake, assistant secretary of commerce, and other members are: Dr. W. F. Durand, president of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers; Pro- fessor E. P. Warner, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; L. K. Bell, Washington, former traffic manager of Air Mail, and C. T. Ludington, Philadelphia, general aircraft operator. Working in the field with Pro- fessor Roe are J. Parker Van Zandt, U. S. Air Service, who has recently nade an extensive study of civil aviation abroad, and Professor Alexander Klemin, head of the aeronautical engineering course in New York Uni- versity.

THE TRANSMUTA- TION OF MERCURY

INTO GOLD

WHAT appears to be inereasing success in the effort of German science to transform mercury into gold is reported in Cothen advices to the American Chemical Society.

In one year. these advices state. tn thou1i nd times as much gold has been produced from the same quantity of mercury through the experiments carried on by Professors Miethe and Stammreich.

Gold has also been obtained, it was said, at the Siemens Works in Berlin by bombarding mercury surfaces with electrons in extremely higl vacuum.

The work of Miethe and Stammreich, it was stated, is dispelling the 4doubt that existed among eminent German chemists, among them Fritz Haber, internationally famous for his development of synthetic ammonia, a large factor in German war plans. Attempts to derive gold from mercury in the United States by the same methods have failed.

The message to the American Chemical Society from its Cothen corre- spondent says the skepticism which was fostered privately and publicly toward the experiments of Professors Miethe and Stammreich on the trans- formation of mercury into gold dwindled when investigators reported be- fore the German Chemical Society the results of their more recent ex- periments.

Professor laber, who previouslv cherished the greatest doubt as to the accuracy of the experiments, congratulated Professor Miethe and re-

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