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The 25 ships, cream of 96 tested for the expedition, are Savoia-Marchetti S-55 hydroplanos* similar to those of the South Atlantic flight, great twin-hulled affairs with the pilots' compartment housed in a bridge between the hulls. Mounted above the bridge are two Isotta-Fraschini engines in tandem, each driving with 800 h.p. a three-bladed propeller. Cruising speed: 137 m.p.h. Cruising range: 2,500 mi.
How soon Balbo's squadron might reach the U. S., once it started, even he would not predict. Given fair weather all the way it could make the seven jumps in a week or ten days. But peasoup fogs boil up around Labrador, and General Balbo has flatly stated that he will turn back rather than foolishly risk a ship. Yet, if he decides to go ahead, he has no patience with a crew which fails to keep its plane where it belongs. His orders: "Arrive with the plane or don't arrive."
L'Atlantico. Technical commander of the flight, organizer and executive is Col. Pellegrini, 44, seasoned naval officer, whose wife is the U. S.-born daughter of Theodore Kaschmann. Metropolitan Opera baritone of 20 years ago. But no other man calls himself, or is called, commander from the moment Italo Balbo steps upon the scene. Glory or blame will fall squarely upon the shoulders of that amazing man whose worshippers call him L'Atlantico.
Famed in Italy's politics of the past five years are two blackbearded men sometimes called "the twins." The other with the beard is Dino Grandi, onetime Minister of Foreign Affairs. There is a story that when II Duce ousted Signor Grandi from the cabinet last year he simultaneously sent Air Minister Balbo a letter informing him that his "resignation was accepted." Minister Balbo is supposed to have marched straight in upon II Duce, handed back the letter as "sent by mistake." That tale is told by antiFascists to illustrate their belief that Premier Mussolini fears his Air Minister because of the latter's personal grip on the Air Force. They go even further, hinting that Mussolini encourages his Minister to lead airplanes across oceans in the hope that he may arrive neither with his ship nor at all. True or false, the fact remains that Twin Grandi is out—a mere Ambassador to Great Britain—while Twin Balbo. welcome or not. stands closer than any man to Benito Mussolini.
Italo Balbo at 23 came out of the War and the hardy Alpine corps with a bronze medal, two silver medals, a lisp and vaguely revolutionary ideas. The last he put into a newspaper called L'Alpino. Back in his native Ferrara where, as a schoolboy, he had organized and led farmworkers in fights against landowners. Balbo was among the first to enroll in the rising movement of Fascism. Enormously ambitious, popping with energy, he made such a good job of clubbing the opposition that he was put in charge of II Duce's own territory. When the Quadrumvirate marched on Rome, one of those quadrumvirs was 26-year-old Italo Balbo, his black shirt sporting the insignia of a lieutenant-general of Fascist militia.