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A Flutter Of Puss Moths

When you're hot and high, you really ought to be careful. What I mean is, when the outside air temperature is 30 degrees Celsius and the elevation is 5 000 feet and you are in an airplane trying to take off, be very careful. That sneaky, invisible thing called air density is watching you and sending warning signals. Aero-engines like breathing thick air, the stuff you find at sea level on a cold day. Not thin air, like you find on mountains on a hot summer's day. If the air is too thin and there is insufficient runway you won't get off the ground; that's it, quite simple. Your airplane will turn into a wheel barrow at the end of the runway and you will go farming.

But don't worry, you frequent flyers, all modern airliners come equipped with two experienced people sitting in the front office who know all about these unseen dangers of hot 'n high and they know what to do about them. In my day (not too long ago) the captain had to look at figures which were all squeezed together on a graph. A WAT curve it was called, where Weight, Altitude and Temperature were compared, and from which the exact length of runway required was extrapolated. A bright young first officer would double-check his answers. Or, better still; a bright first officer would do all the sums and the captain would check his answers. It's all computerized nowadays. On-board computers will do just about everything, except hit the pilot on the head with a hammer, to prevent any miscalculations. The captain still does his sums, though, and so does his bright companion (you will be pleased to hear).

But, if you are sitting on a high plateau on a hot, hot day in the middle of the boondocks in a de Havilland Puss Moth, with a full load of passengers, you have a problem. Back in the 1930's RANA (Rhodesian and Nyasaland Airways) operated little Puss Moths (DH-80's) all over central Africa; one pilot, three pax. Take-off performance graphs were a thing of the future and the runways were... shall we say, less than adequate. Seat of the pants flying and eyeball calculations were the only way, back then. You stood on the brakes at the start of the take off run, turned the volume control to max (the throttle only increased the noise, not the thrust on 130hp engines) and then let her rip. If the wheels got stuck in tufts of grass, or mud, you asked your passengers (very politely) to get out and push, before trying again. Seriously! And some old pilots were known to ask their back-seat passengers to lean forward during the take-off run to help get the tail wheel off the ground. Those were the days.

There was a large 'flutter' of de Havilland Moths in central Africa between the World Wars - - Cirrus Moths, Gipsy Moths, Puss Moths, Leopard Moths, Fox, Hornet and Tiger Moths, each an improvement on the one before. First was the Cirrus Moth with a tough, simple little 65 horse power engine and lightweight, wooden frame. This little machine revolutionized everyday, private flying all over the world. They were reliable and affordable. Later refinements had more powerful engines, some inverted. The inverted engines improved forward visibility by positioning the pistons below the crankshaft and out of the pilot's line of sight. Oil spray on windshields was reduced as well. With time, split axles, larger wing spans, jury struts and air brakes were added as aeronautical design improved.

But, it was the arrival of the Puss Moth that introduced the first cabin-type monoplane to the world of commercial aviation. There were four of them at RANA and they brought the era of the 'scarf and goggles' to an end. They were amazing little airplanes, when you consider that only 30 years earlier, at Kitty Hawk, the first "heavier than air machine left the earth under its own power... and landed on ground as high as that from which it took off." Geoffrey de Havilland was a remarkable man, way ahead of his time.

I would love to have flown around central Africa in one of Sir Geoffrey's old Moths. But, sadly, I was not even a twinkle in my father's eye in those days. And in this aviation game, you are never in the right place at the right time; always too young or too old. That's the way it goes. When you have enough experience to be a good pilot, it's time to think about retiring. And when you are young and fit, you don't have enough experience. But I wonder why Geoffrey chose the name 'Moth'? They are ghostly little critters that flit about at twilight and bang into walls and things. Not a good name for an airplane. Although, on second thought, maybe it's because moths are metamorphic and very beautiful? Yes, that's it; 'Moth' describes them perfectly.

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