LOSS OF ITALIA.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 41, 18 February 1929, Page 7

LOSS OF ITALIA.

Professor Believes Some Of

Crew Are Alive.

PATHETIC SCENE AT LECTURE

(Australian and X.Z. Tress Association.) LONDON*, February 17.

A message from Rome says Professor Behounek, of Prague University, is in the Italian capital for the purpose of giving evidence before the Government inquiry into the loss of the airship Italia in the Arctic. In the course <>>' a lecture he referred to late Professor* Malmgren and Pontremoli, and suddenly broke down and hurried out of the hail, his hands over his face.

Subsequently Professor Behounek to'd the Rome correspondent of the "Morning Post" that he had often lectured on the subject but never had his feelings -~ overcome him. He explained his motion by saying: It is because 1 believe there is still a chance that those who were carried away in the envelope of the Italia are still alive and suffering in a remote part of Franz Josef Land or Northern Spitsbergen. Those vast areas have not been fully searched. Yon. as Englishmen, know how many years the English continued to look for Franklin and other lost explorers before giving them up.