DRAMATIC RESCUE

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 25, 31 January 1933, Page 7

DRAMATIC RESCUE

RADIO OBTAINS HELP.

CALL HEARD IN NEW ZEALAND.

MAN GASSED IN" AT.ABKA3T HUT.

Through 10,000 miles of ether the faint whisper of a radio key stuttered and went dead

A man lay unconscious in a gas-filled shack in Teller, Alaska, his hand limp beside the radio key (states the San Francisco "Examiner").

In the electric silence which followed, a man on the other side of the world, in New Zealand, sensed danger in the sudden halting of the message. His hand flashed to his own key, and he sent out this appeal:

"Come in—come in—any Pacific Coast amateur —please answer—emergency!"

Colonel Claire Foster, millionaire radio amateur of Carmel, answered the appeal, and learned to his amazement that danger was striking at his old friend, Clyde Devinna, famous motion picture cameraman and star operator for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was Devinna who lay unconscious in that Alaska shack, with the snow hanked up to the windows. Colonel Foster, 8000 miles nearer the scene of danger, swung his powerful radio set into action and made contact with another amateur at Teller. The Alaskan amateur hastily donned his furs and snow shoes and hurried to Devinna's shack. He smashed in thei door and dragged Devinna to safety.' He had been overcome by carbon monoxide fumes from a small gasoline heater.

Only recently this startling drama of the radio world became known. Colonel Foster, in Carmel, was being congratulated by the fraternity of amateur radio operators for the strange "round-the-world" rescue which took place just before Christmas.

Devinna has fully recovered from his terrifying experience, and is proceeding with the filming of an Alaskan picture. Famous for his work on "White ov <idows," "Pagan," and "Trader Horn," Devinna also is well known to the amateur radio world. He carries & portable short-wave set wherever he goes "on location."

Devinna and Colonel Foster were comrades during the World War, and have maintained radio contact since then.