Speed Limit

Is there a limit to airplane speed? Since the Pulitzer race, this is a subject of keen controversy.

"No limit," say the engineers with Glenn H. Curtiss, famous aviation pioneer, at their head. More power, better wings, wings that grow smaller in flight, landing gears that disappear in flight and cut down air resistance, flight at 40,000 feet where the air is thin and offers less resistance--these things place 500 miles an hour within reach.

"A limit soon," say the medicos. When a machine is turned sharply, it is inclined to the center of the turn much like a bicycle carrying a corner. Centrifugal force throws the blood outward. It leaves the brain and rushes to the lower parts of the body, even as far as the feet. This, according to Major L. H. Bauer, Commandant of the Aviation Medical School at Mitchell Field, was the cause of Pilot Williams' loss of consciousness in the Pulitzer race a fortnight ago. At greater speeds there would be no recovery of consciousness--in other words, death.