Chapter 397

1898 welcomed the end in the noise of the Colombian Civil War; as time came to 1899, for Spain, good news came one after another.

First is the flight experiment that had already been conducted at the end of 1897, and another one was conducted at the end of 1898.

The Eagle test airplane at this time has already come to the third generation, which is the Eagle No. 3 airplane.

The reason why the previous Eagle No. 2 was not mentioned much is mainly because the interval was too short, and compared with the Eagle No. 1 airplane, there was no great progress, so the Sky project team did not report the test content to Gao Da.

Compared with the Eagle No. 2 airplane, the improvement of the Eagle No. 3 airplane is much greater.

First, in order to improve the lift of the airplane, the new Eagle No. 3 airplane has much larger wings than the original No. 1 and No. 2 airplanes.

The area of the wings compared to the Eagle No. 1 airplane has increased by more than double, and the total area of the wings has already exceeded 41 square meters.

Increasing the wing area is only one link in the airplane's improvement. The new Eagle No. 3 airplane uses a more powerful gasoline engine, and this engine is exactly the latest product developed by the National Power Laboratory.

Under the circumstances that power and lift are both improved, it is naturally a matter of course that the flight time and distance of this airplane have been greatly improved.

According to the report results of the Sky project team, the flight distance of the Eagle No. 3 airplane has already exceeded 30 kilometers, and the time of staying in the air has exceeded 20 minutes many times.

Compared with the Eagle No. 1 airplane's flight time of less than a minute, the results achieved by the Eagle No. 3 airplane obviously already have relatively huge progress.

If it is said that the Eagle No. 1 airplane only showed the powerful potential of the airplane, then the Eagle No. 3 airplane has already infinitely improved the role of the airplane.

As the flight time and flight distance of the airplane become longer and longer, it also means that it is not far from the appearance of a military airplane that truly possesses combat capability.

For the third flight experiment conducted at the end of 1898, Spain still conducted high-level confidentiality.

At the same time, the first airship experiment in Spain is also being conducted hotly.

Compared with the slow progress of airplanes, airships showed extremely powerful immediate combat capability at the beginning of the experiment.

The current airplane can only fly a distance of 30 kilometers at most, and it cannot ensure the airplane's successful takeoff and landing.

But airships are different; the first-generation airship produced by Spain's airship laboratory was already able to conduct free navigation within dozens of kilometers.

The reason why it can only fly a distance of dozens of kilometers is actually the main reason because it is the first experiment; the experimental personnel, in order to ensure safety, set the flight distance of the airship relatively short.

The takeoff and landing of airships are much safer than airplanes; as long as the airship itself does not have any accidents, the flight process is quite safe.

Currently, according to the report of the airship research and development project team, in the next experiment, they will consider flying a distance of hundreds or even hundreds of kilometers and improve the safety of the airship as much as possible.

If it can really do a safe flight of hundreds of kilometers, it actually also means that the commercialization of airships is not far away. After all, the area of Spain's local area is not large, and the widest distance from east to west is only a little over 1,000 kilometers.

If the airship can fly a distance of hundreds of kilometers, it also means that the airship can easily take off and land in any city in Spain, which is what airplanes are far from reaching at present.

Compared with the various concealments of the research and development results of airplanes, Spain did not have the slightest concealment for the research and development results of airships, and even made them public through newspaper reporting.

When European countries all paid attention to Spain's newspaper reporting, they were shocked by Spain's airship technology.

Because according to Spain's current airship technology, it has already been able to carry two people or heavy objects of the same weight to fly to the sky and fly a distance of dozens of kilometers.

Flying to the sky is not strange to European countries. As early as the American Civil War, there was a position named military observer, whose task was to take a balloon to the sky to observe the deployment of the armies of both sides.

Of course, the position of military observer is as unreliable as his task, and the probability of sacrifice is very large.

But it cannot be denied that at that time, there were already means to let people rise to the sky for a short time, and this is not a goal that looks sci-fi and cannot be achieved.

Rising to the sky is indeed not difficult, but flying dozens of kilometers in the sky and landing safely is something that European countries look like they are somewhat difficult to do.

It is precisely because of this that when Spain announced the research and development results for airships, European countries were immediately shocked, and there were dozens of newspaper media from various European countries rushing to Spain, competing to report news related to airships.

Gao Da's purpose is to let European countries and these media focus their attention on the development of airships, so for these European newspapers that rushed to Spain one after another, Gao Da did not have any obstruction.

It is also because of this that at the beginning of 1899, under the recording of cameras from dozens of newspapers from more than ten European countries, Spain's airship successfully conducted its second flight test.

Compared with the first conservative experiment that only conducted a flight of dozens of kilometers, the second flight experiment looked much bolder.

The departure point of the second flight experiment is still Spain's capital, Ma Deli, and the destination is the large city of Valladolid in the north of Ma Deli.

Valladolid is the capital of the Castile-Leon state, separated from Ma Deli by the Central Mountains.

The reason why this place was chosen as the destination of the flight experiment is, on one hand, because the straight-line distance between Valladolid and Ma Deli is 162 kilometers, which is a reasonable experimental interval that is neither too close nor too far.

On the other hand, Valladolid and Ma Deli are separated by the Central Mountains, which just happens to be able to show the airship's ability to cross mountains and plateaus.

Spain also wants to express a point to the outside world through this experiment, which is that the flight of the airship will not have any terrain restrictions; it can fly a distance of nearly 200 kilometers in Spain, and it can also fly a distance of more than 200 kilometers in other European countries.

If it is said that the last flight experiment where the airship could fly dozens of kilometers only made European newspapers and media shocked, then the flight distance of this flight experiment is enough to make newspaper media from various European countries express their doubts.

This is not a short distance of dozens of kilometers; just the straight-line distance is as high as 162 kilometers.

Even if the airship is flying in the sky, it is impossible to maintain an absolute straight-line drive. This actually also means that if the airship wants to fly from Ma Deli to Valladolid, the flight distance will infinitely approach 200 kilometers.

An airship that can carry people or hundreds of jin of heavy objects to fly a distance of nearly 200 kilometers is something that the reporters of these newspaper media simply cannot believe.