NO MARGIN FOR ERROR : The U. S. Navy's Transpacific Flight of 1925

by Messimer, Dwight R

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Annapolis 1981, Naval Institute Pr, First US edition , hard bound in dust jacket, 6x9, VG/VG condition, vi, 167 pages, illus, maps, drawings, appendices, notes, bibliog, index. ......................................................................This incredible tale of human adventure was the event of its day-five American pilots adrift at sea and forced to sail their downed aircraft to Hawaii-but little is known about the background of bitter political maneuvering and interservice rivalry against which the PN9-1 made her "successful failure."..............................................................................Six years before the Navy's attempted transpacific flight, General William "Billy" Mitchell had emerged as the self-appointed champion of American aviation. He wanted not only to advance Army aviation, but to create an independent air force responsible for all U. S. aviation matters. Grabbing headlines-and politicians-whenever he could, Mitchell, whose goal was to swallow up the Navy's air arm, launched public attacks on the Navy. In mid1924 he was close to achieving his objective.......................................................................Navy planners were worriedly looking for a way to hold off the general and at the same time convince the public that naval air crews and naval aircraft were a vital part of the fleet. What they needed was to have naval aviators do something spectacular: a nonstop flight from the West Coast to Hawaii, some 2,100 nautical miles, would fill the bill. Unfortunately, no plane in the fleet could fly that far, but the Navy announced the forthcoming flight, anyway.A series of tests, failures, and last-minute changes accompanied the development of the planes that were to attempt the momentous flight. The PN9s were shot through with deficiencies, and their only chance for success lay / with a boost from the fickle trade winds. There was no margin for error..............................................................................................Dwight Messimer's riveting true-to-life tale is stranger and more exciting than fiction. Here, on the eve of their transpacific flight, are the PN9s making their first full-load takeoff tests in full view of thousands of spectators, and they have to strain to get airborne-not to mention the serious problems that beset them the next day when they were under way. Here is the crisis of the PN9-3, whose oil-starved port engine forced her to make an abrupt and violent landing in a heaving sea. And here also is the story of the crew of the PN9-1: adrift, ill-prepared for survival at sea, mourned by the world as lost, found almost by accident, and threatened with destruction by one of their rescuers within minutes of safe harbor.....................................................................................................Legendary and unlikely heroes move through the pages, but the most fascinating is the commander of the PN9-1, John Rogers. A Naval Academy graduate, Rogers was the second naval officer to be trained as a pilot and the first to take instruction from the Wright brothers. Ultimately, his ingenuity in changing the hapless aircraft into a makeshift sailboat and navigating it across the ocean for nine days saved the crew and contributed to the Navy's campaign to maintain and enlarge the role of naval aviation. . ISBN: 0-87021-497-7.