Alcock & Brown 4: the Actual Goddamn Flight
Tent of Construction, Quidi Vidi. The warming shed. Vimy under construction. As anybody who uses their garage can tell you, keeping it dry when doing something is a help. On May 26th, the ship with the disassembled Vimy finally entered St. John's harbor. Vickers contracted the Teamster Lester, who hauled the massive shipping crates containing the Vimy and its spares to Quidi Vidi. There the Vickers crew set to work doing what its rivals had done: figuring out how to assemble an aircraft with a full set of tools but none of the structures or jigs, cranes, etc they normally would use, in an open field where the wind blew very cold. A tent gave some shelter, but they still needed a warming shack on the premises. Frequent rain squalls were also cold, and meant all work had to stop to cover completed sections in tarpaulins. It was cold enough that soldering irons warmed in a fire would often cool before they could be applied. Despite the difficul...