I can also remember when the Weather Bureau was dependent entirely upon the generosity of the air-line people to install things which the Weather Bureau needed, and which Uncle Sam had not chosen at that time to provide.

I said here on last Thursday that the airways are not solely for the use of the air lines.

If you see fit to give the air lines a right-of-way through the airspace, as you have given the railroads a right-of-way, the air lines would be glad to equip their right-of-way airways 100 percent with private capital; but I trust you will realize that the air is free. Everybody should have access to it. "Free as the air" is an old saying. The major use of our airways has been by the Army, Navy, Coast Guard, and private flyers. Three years ago only about 17 percent of the use was by the air lines. The airway is like the navigable waterway and there should be given no rights-of-way or monopoly to any private body either of our waterways or our airways.

Mr. HINSHAW. Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Hinshaw.

Mr. HINSHAW. I wonder if Colonel Gorrell will comment on the ultrahigh frequency range system and the necessity for it in the United States, and what has happened to the ranges installed experimentally. Colonel GORRELL. The radio range system we have used in the past, without getting technical, was excellent for its time, but it contained many defects.

When I was before you in connection with the civil aeronautics bill I had large maps showing the needs of important in radio ranges, and why accidents had been caused by the lack of such improvements.

The ultrahigh frequency system gives you more frequencies; frequencies that other people will not interfere with, is more accurate and, generally speaking, gets away from the sins of the older types of radio.

The Department of Commerce, through the Administrator, had started to equip the airways with ultra high frequency when the war interfered. It will be necessary, I presume, to complete the installations when the war is over.

Mr. HINSHAW. Have some of these radio ranges been removed? Colonel GORRELL. Without going into details, yes; and in a moment from now I had expected to suggest that the Congress might see fit to place in escrow, so to speak, the costs of the items being taken off the airways, and sent abroad for the use of our own troops, and the troops of our allies. If you escrow that money it will be available, without new appropriations, to fill up the gaps after the war.

Mr. HINSHAW. It is very important to notice that some of these ultra high frequency ranges have been removed and sent elsewhere and no credit apparently has been given to the airways system in removing these things.

Colonel GORRELL. So far as I know no credit whatsoever has been given the airways for the removal of these vitally necessary things. Mr. HINSHAW. And consequently it will be necessary to receive further high-frequency equipment not only to replace those removed, but install others to complete the range system throughout the United States.

Colonel GORRELL. It would seem to me wise to accomplish that result by having, let us say, the War Department pay the Depart

ment of Commerce for those items which are removed. The Department of Commerce could then keep that money in escrow until such time as priorities would permit it to rebuild the gaps that now or will exist.

As the Congressman says, when our country started building air lines all around the world for military purposes, we needed devices to guide our Army and Navy officers and the pilots of our allies and such devices were just pulled up from the airways and shipped abroad.

Mr. HINSHAW. I think it might be interesting to describe the improvement made in ultra high frequency for radio-range purposes over the ordinary frequencies heretofore used, in the matter of static and penetration and so forth.

Colonel GORRELL. With the ordinary frequency we have been using, static gets through, and very often in thunderstorms and bad weather conditions, the pilots cannot hear or at least cannot hear accurately what the range signal is.

With the ultra high frequency the static is, to a major extent, blanked out and the pilot can fly through unfavorable atmospheric conditions and hear accurately.

Mr. HINSHAW. That is particularly important over mountainous areas, such as in the distances from here to Cleveland or from Cheyenne to Salt Lake, is it not?

Colonel GORRELL. The ranges which they have been using not only sometimes had multiple courses, and so forth, as we mentioned, but static and other things occurred. With ultra high frequency that is not supposed to be true. In our tests so far we have found the ultra high to be accurate.

In the development of our rivers and harbors there have been many instances of constructive long-range planning, of adherence to a definite program, regularly implemented by appropriations that remain available until expended, with the result that both from the standpoint of our national defense and from the standpoint of our commerce the Nation was immeasurably strengthened. An even more extensive and comprehensive degree of planning in the case of our air navigation facilities than the planning pursued with respect to our water navigation facilities is called for. It would appear most appropriate that the Congress should definitely spell out in the law a mandate calling for a continuous long-range development program, with provision for regular and frequent reports concerning its attainment. Surely no one is better qualified than the Administrator of Civil Aeronautics to discharge such an all-important function. The importance of our air-navigation facilities, including proper airport development, does not need elaboration.

If I may say just one word there, Mr. Chairman, Guadalcanal itself is not worth the life of a single soldier or single marine. What we are fighting for there and what the Japs have tried so hard to regain is control of that single miserable air field.

You may, however, be particularly interested to know that because of the splendid work which the Administrator of Civil Aeronautics did under the Civil Aeronautics Act in building up our airway aids, this country has been able at a time of deepest crisis to transfer certain of our facilities from our own shores to points abroad in order that our aircraft and the aircraft of our allies may be guided

through fog and storm to happy landings. How this simple transfer of going facilities may have saved crucial areas of the world from invasion by the aggressor is a chapter of our recent history which we cannot tell now, but which, it may be hoped, will not be buried in the archives and forgotten after the war is over.

While on this subject, I might suggest that either this committee or other appropriate authority consider the desirability of providing new appropriations to remain available without time limitation, so far as possible, which may be used at the proper time to restore the facilities which have been thus contributed.

In fact, consideration might well be given by the committee to an amendment of relevant provisions of the statutes so as to make all appropriations for air navigation facilities available until expended-just as are appropriations for lighthouses and rivers and harbors so that expenditure can be made as proves best instead of requiring unexpended funds to revert to the Treasury. With the committee's permission, I would like to insert here a memorandum on this subject.

Mr. Chairman, it takes a long time to build certain types of airway devices. Rather than hurry them through, because the money will revert if you do not, it would be better to make appropriations for the airways stand on the same footing as appropriations for rivers and harbors and lighthouses, so that you can build them well and build them intelligently, and, with your permission, I would like to insert in the record laws governing lighthouses, rivers and harbors appropriations, and suggest an amendment for air navigation facilities along that same line.

The CHAIRMAN. Very well.

(The memorandum referred to is as follows:)

MEMORANDUM ON APPROPRIATIONS FOR AIR NAVIGATION FACILITIES

The act of June 20, 1874, 18 Statutes 85, 110, in the form in which it appears today, reads as follows:

"SEC. 5. That from and after the first day of July, eighteen hundred seventyfour, and of each year thereafter, the Secretary of the Treasury shall cause all unexpended balances of appropriations which shall have remained upon the books of the Treasury for two fiscal years to be carried to the surplus fund and covered into the Treasury: Provided, That this provision shall not apply to permanent specific appropriations, appropriations for rivers and harbors, lighthouses, or public buildings, or the pay of the Navy and Marine Corps; but the appropriations named in this proviso shall continue available until otherwise ordered by Congress" (18 Stat. 110; 24 Stat. 157; 40 Stat. 1039) (31 U. S. C. A. 713).

The act of August 24, 1912, an appropriation act for that year, 37 Statutes 417, 487, reads today in part as follows:

"SEC. 7. No specific or indefinite appropriation made hereafter in any regular annual appropriation Act shall be construed to be permanent or available continuously without reference to a fiscal year unless it belongs to one of the following four classes: 'rivers and harbors,' 'lighthouses,' 'public buildings,' and 'pay of the Navy and Marine Corps,' last specifically named in and excepted from the operation of the provisions of the so-called 'covering-in-Act,' approved June 20, 1874, or unless it is made in terms expressly providing that it shall continue available beyond the fiscal year for which the appropriation Act in which it is contained makes provision" (37 Stat. 487; 40 Stat. 1309) (31 U. S. C. A. 718).

Colonel GORRELL. By virtue of these two statutes, the unexpended balances of appropriations for lighthouses and rivers and harbors are available beyond the fiscal year for which such appropriations were made.

It would appear to be possible to make appropriations for air navigation facilities similarly available by amending the two sections quoted above as follows:

The first quoted section could be amended by inserting, after the words "marine corps," the words "or air navigation facilities."

The second passage quoted above could also be amended by (1) striking out the word "four" and inserting in lieu thereof the word "five," and (2) by inserting, after the words "marine corps," the words "air navigation facilities."

Mr. HINSHAW. Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Hinshaw.

Mr. HINSHAW. Before the Colonel gets off of the subject of airnavigation facilities, and in order to develop the subject, I would like to inquire what ideas are in his mind concerning the expansion of the landing system that is experimentally installed in Indianapolis for blind landing, or a possible combination of such a system with the ultra high frequency radio range.

Colonel GORRELL. Mr. Congressman, that should be done at the earliest possible moment. We had hoped it would be done before now. It has been started by now. According to my recollection, we have in this country approximately nine such systems. We have coming through now many more such systems. Those systems will probably go to where our military needs are most critical. For the moment, until priorities are more readily available, I doubt if many of them will be installed on our commercial air lines.

With the instrument landing system, a man can take off and land more accurately than he can by seeing the ground.

It is possible to come down on the beam and not only strike the runway but strike the middle of the runway and land regardless of atmospheric conditions.

The day will come, and come soon, when probably all airports will be so equipped and at least the major ones will have to be so equipped.

Mr. HINSHAW. Can that system be completely substituted for the radio range system insofar as guiding the plane of flight is concerned?

Colonel GORRELL. Mr. Congressman, you are too technical for me to answer that accurately. It can for certain distances out from the airport but whether it would be wise to trust it too far away or not, I do not know.

The major accuracy we have obtained so far has been about 25 miles from the airport. The radio range will bring you to the vicinity of the airport, and some 25 miles or so away from the airport, the pilot may contact the instrument landing system. It leads him accurately to the ground.

For the information of the members of the committee, I may say the instrument landing system is a radio beam in the form of a parabola. A parabola is this shape [indicating]; running outward from the very center of the field and extending upward in this shape [indicating]. The pilot puts his plane on the beam, watches an instrument in front of him that contains two crossed hairs like a surveyor's instrument, simply keeps the needle in the center, and the device brings him right down to where he should be.

Mr. HINSHAW. It is a remarkable system, and I wonder why, as it has been in experimental use for a number of years now, why it has not been pushed forward even before the war.

Colonel GORRELL. Mr. Congressman, I understand the answer to that is that a few years ago there were several systems. Each had its own friends advocating it. At the time the Department of Commerce started to install the system they thought best, the Army differed with them. The President entered the picture and suggested that the matter be studied so that instrument landing systems would be standard throughout the country, just as is the gage of railroad tracks; just as the railroad train can go from one line to another with the same gage of railroad tracks, so it was desirable that the instrument landing system be standard so that a stranger coming into an airport in times of adverse atmospheric conditions would be able to utilize the system his own airplane was capable of handling. That delayed the matter for a while and held up the order for the device. After that matter was settled, the Department of Commerce was able to proceed.

Then, of course, after that you had to wait for appropriations. There is one other point that I would like to suggest while talking on this subject: I would like to suggest that it be spelled out in the bill, if you will, that the Administrator should proceed on airways like the Department of Commerce proceeds on waterways in one respect: When the Engineer Corps certifies that a body of navigable water is open for navigation, the Department of Commerce immediately sends to Congress a deficiency appropriation, if necessary, asking for the cash to install the lighthouses, and buoys, and lights, and so on.

This is so with aviation. When the Civil Aeronautics Board hands down a decision and says that the public necessity and convenience requires a line from A to B, that line is not going to be of much value to the country until the airways' aids are placed upon it.

The system has always been that the Department of Commerce waits until it makes up its regular annual appropriation and lumps the aids for this new airway, which has been certified as being necessary, with everything else it has got in mind and then those aids have to run the gantlet of the Bureau of the Budget and come to Congress, and run up against various mix-ups, with everything else in mind. If the appropriation is not big enough to include everything, the aids for the airways may be thrown out, and as a result you may wait many years before you get the aids after the routes. have been certified to have been necessary.

It seems to us that there is no reason for a difference between the appropriations for the aids on waterways and the aids on airways, under the conditions we are discussing. When the Board hands down its decision that the line from A to B is necessary in the public interest, it seems to me the Administrator should follow that up at once, just as in the case of aids for navigation of water, such as lighthouses on the waterways, and send to Congress a statement so that you can pass upon whether you desire to appropriate for those aids.

Mr. WOLVERTON. Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Wolverton.