The Future of Transport

The Future of Transport

GC: This month we are interviewing Archibald Estblower, one of England’s pioneers of ‘lighter than air’ or ‘flying’ machines, who hopes one day to be able to fly like the birds.

AE: I think I have to correct you there straight away. I do not intend to actually fly like the birds personally, that would just not be possible.

Birds are creatures that have, over several millions of years, evolved into creatures that are well suited, some may go as far as to say designed, for flying in the air - hence they are very good at it indeed. Humans on the other hand, were created by God in his own image. Far be it from me to criticise the almighty, but great as the human design is, it does lack the ability to fly and one can only imagine why God, with his infinite wisdom and all that did not look to perhaps make the odd improvement on the original prototype.

Just imagine if God had given us wings. Travelling about would be so much faster because we could fly everywhere. We wouldn’t all need to go about on horses polluting our cities by dropping dung in the street. Although I suppose if we didn’t need horses we wouldn’t need anyone to make horseshoes either, so all the blacksmiths would be out of a job. I suppose it’s small details like these that get considered if you are God, and you are trying to construct the perfect being to rule the wonderful planet that you spent the best part of a week making. So no, I do not intend to fly like the birds. What I intend to do is build a machine which I can sit in, which will be able to fly perhaps alongside the birds, although obviously not with their natural grace and elegance. Or feathers.

GC: Yes I see. How long have you had this dream of building such a flying machine?

AE: Well It’s an idea I’ve had since I was a young boy. It was indeed inspired by birds. I remember sitting on the lawn in Cheltenham looking up at some geese that were flying over head. As I was admiring their poise, and the effortlessness of the flight, one of the blighters dropped something nasty in my eye. And ever since then I’ve wanted to fly higher than the geese and drop something on them, and see how they like it.

GC: So how is progress on the machine currently? Have you succeeded in making it fly yet?

AE: Well, we are still at a pioneering stage, so the first thing really is to define what we mean by ‘flight’.

GC: I suppose it is generally taken to mean being supported in the air by the air itself , even for a brief period of time.

AE: In that case no.

GC: So you haven’t had any success at all so far then?

AE: Again it depends on how, in such a pioneering venture, you define success. I think some people may say that I have actually had a fair amount of success. But I’m not one of them.

The problem I found at a very early stage with making machines that are meant to fly despite being heavier than air, is that by their very nature of being heavier than air that they tend to not fly as one would hope, but more rather just stay exactly where they are on the ground. I cleverly deduced that I would have to find a way of making the machine leave the ground as a first step to making it fly.

At first I drew inspiration again from the birds. I watched how birds take off and I wondered if I would be able to construct a machine that could mimic this action. The more I watched and the more I thought about it, the more I realised that I hadn’t got a clue how do it. Especially not using wrought iron. It was then that I had the amazing breakthrough. The one single idea that may yet make flight possible.

I had been out hunting that morning shooting salmon, pesky vermin, get them under your floorboards and you’ll know about it. But I watched how they were able to leap into the air, and this is the important bit, without the use of wings. That’s why we’ve been going wrong - copying birds. If a fish, another creature that is not meant to fly can do it, then surely humans, who are much smarter than a fish, should be able to use their method also. Salmon use their bodies to leap by flicking their tails in the water to give then lift. It’s this movement that I’ve tried to integrate into the design of my latest machine.

GC: So it moves like a fish?

AE: No, it moves like a two halves of a bedstead linked by a steam piston. It’s a terrible design. It has the nasty habit of catapulting you sideways into the riverbank.

GC: So it’s not really of any use at all then?

AE: Oh I wouldn’t say that. If the need ever arises for persons to be catapulted sideways into riverbanks than it has a lot of use. In fact I’d say it excels at catapulting people sideways into riverbanks. In the fast growing world of catapulting people sideways into riverbanks, my machine is at the forefront of technology. I’m sure any of my helpers who have died during testings will proud of what they have helped to achieve.

GC: Died? How often do your helpers die testing the machine.

AE: Oh, only the once usually. That tends to be the way. Death’s like that. It may be bad but it only happens once. It kind of evens out the fact that you can only be born once. If it wasn’t for simple rules like that we would have anarchy. You would have all these people, immortals, who are born but are never going to die. They would constantly be arguing with all the people who are going to die, but never actually had to be born. The people who hadn’t been born would say “Oh I’m better than you ‘cos I’ve been here since the dawn of time and I know everything there is to know”. The immortals would reply “Well you won’t know what will happen on Tuesday if you fall off a cliff on Monday will you?”.

Then all the people who either are going to be born or die more than once will come along and start a fight with the immortals and the always-been-heres, because they know that even if they get killed they’ve got another go. And if after that all the people who didn’t need to be born but weren’t going to ever die either came along, well it would just start getting ridiculous. But I have to add I wouldn’t ask any of my helpers to do anything that I wouldn’t do myself, except get in the machine.

GC: You’re 67 now. Do you think you’ll succeed in being the first man to invent a flying machine?

AE: I intend to fly if it’s the last thing I do. I’m determined to be the first man to invent a flying machine, or failing that, the second or third man to do so.

The

GC Interview

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