Читать книгу H. G. Hawker, airman: his life and work онлайн

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“Hawker all this time was steadily plodding away, making the safest flight possible, and the very machine had a look of determination about it. The two slow-speed propellers turned solemnly round, and the engine explosions were lost in a continual buzz through the high engine speed. That he was out to win if possible was obvious from every movement. Raynham’s champions grew a little nervous over the flippancy of their pilot, and a shutter of one of the sheds was quickly requisitioned, on which were painted the words in large letters: ‘Fly higher.’ It had not much effect, however, although it served apparently to sober him a little.

“Towards one o’clock impatient questions as to how much oil and petrol they were carrying began to circulate amongst the onlookers, and it appeared that Raynham’s oil supply was likely to run out before anything else. On more than one occasion the Green suddenly slowed down in revolutions, only to pick up again just as quickly. Someone pointed out later on that the short pipes coupled to the exhaust ports in the cylinders of the Green no longer emitted the puffs of smoke that had been prominent in the earlier stages of the flight, and misgivings as to the oil supply began to travel abroad.