FATE OF PILOT IN BUSH CRASH UNSOLVED

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28897, 18 May 1959, Page 10

FATE OF PILOT IN BUSH CRASH UNSOLVED

(New Zealand Press Association)

AUCKLAND, May 17. The fate of the pilot of the light aircraft found in rugged country inland from Wairoa last week—two years and a half after it was lost on a cross-country flight—was still undetermined tonight after two search parties had combed the area during the weekend. The search parties believe that the pilot. Mr A. N. Clark, a Thames contractor, probably escaped without serious injury from the crashed plane. Signs found around the aircraft indicated he had sheltered nearby and then attempted to follow watercourses leading to the coast. The week-end search parties scoured an area of 700 yards radius around the aircraft without success. Another party will enter the bush at dawn tomorrow to follow a nearby stream where a pair of sunglasses was found. Police heading the search for the pilot are puzzled by several things. One of these is the discovery of the aircraft’s hatchet near the scene of the accident. “It is the last thing we would expect the pilot to leave behind,” said Sergeant W. T. Pender, of the Napier police, who is in charge of the search. Bandages Removed The medical chest carried in the plane was found 15 feet away in a depression formed by an underground stream. Although secured only by a strip of adhesive tape, the lid had been broken with the hatchet and all the bandages removed. The Inspector of Aircraft Accidents (Wing Commander O. J. O’Brien) is due in Wairoa early this week to investigate the accident. The aircraft, a two-seater smgleengined Taylorcraft monoplane, was lost on November 23, 1956, while on a flight from Rotorua to Wairoa. Mr Clark was on his way to inspect approaches to a new bridge on the Napier-Wairoa State highway. The aircraft was found on the crest of a small hill between Lake Waikaremoana and Rapunga by

Mr Victor Keen, manager of a logging company. It was nose down in heavy bush less than half a mile from where loggers have been cutting timber. Mr Keen found the cabin door open and the logbook, pilot’s licence and other papers in a sodden leather case nearby. One wing of the plane had struck a large tree and the aircraft had come to rest with its nose tilted downward and its tail in the air. Propeller Broken The propeller had broken off, but the engine was almost undamaged. A tree stump had smashed through a wing and another had stuck through the fuselage behind the pilot’s cabin. There was a tear in the after fuselage, but the tail was undamaged. Nearby in the tangled undergrowth Mr Keen found a small makeshift bed made of two cushions from the seat of the aircraft. The cushions had been placed on top of paper wadding in the shelter of a clump of ferns. Fifty yards away, where the underground stream came to the surface, there was a pair of sunglasses in a rotted case. There was no other trace of the pilot. The only evidence unearthed by the parties that scoured the area at the week-end was three unopened morphine tubes from the medicine chest. These were found a few yards from the aircraft. Searchers will concentrate tomorrow on the theory that Mr Clark made his way along the stream in an effort to reach the coast. The stream eventually flows into the Waiau river. However, it is two days’ journey to the Waiau, and another day’s to the nearest habitation. The theory that Mr Clark was not seriously injured is supported by the condition of the cockpit, which virtually escaped damage. The safety seat belt in the pilot’s seat was found undone, but not broken.