AIR TRAGEDY

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 252, 22 July 1935, Page 9

AIR TRAGEDY

Dutch Liner Crashes In Switzerland

ALL ABOARD KILLED

Company’s Third Disaster In Short Time ■ MOUNTA IN SID E SI RUC K By relegru|ili.-Press assn.—Copyright ' Received .Inly 21. 7.30 p.m.) Milan, July 20. Ihe Royal Dutch air liner, I’h.'.kg. a Douglas, similar to that whic h competed in the Centenary Race, when en route from Milan to Frankfurt. crashed near San Bernardino, .Switzerland, during a severe storm. Thy thirteen occupants were killed. They included two British subjects. The others were Dutch. The cause of the disaster in unknown. The British victims are Commander Arthur Watts. D. 5.0.. and Mr. Louis Mariano Nesbitt, a. mining engineer ami tlie author of books on Abyssinia, where he travelled adventurously in districts from which whites formerly had not returned alive. Commander Watts was hastening from Italy to rejoin his wife, who recently gave birth to their second son. An airline company official states that the pilot. Van Dcr Veist, when crossing the frontier of Switzerland, encountered fog and asked for a bearing from Milan 15 minutes before the crash. Ho then wound in the aerial owing to the thunderstorm. He came out of the clouds and found himself too near the ground, and therefore attempted to climb up through the clouds, but collided with a mountainside.

The villagers of San Bernardino state that, the aeroplane crashed into a pine forest clothing a deep ravine with such violence that debris was tiling up. The propeller was later found embedded in a tree fifty yards distant. Rescuers rushed to the spot and found all dead but Mademoiselle Hermanides, the first of four stewardesses recently engaged, who was making her first trip from Holland. She was hastily extricated, but died in a few minutes.

Capable of carrying up to 18 passengers, at speeds varying between 190 and 210 in.p.h., the Douglas DC2 airliner is one of the most efficient aeroplanes of today. Produced in America, and operated with success there, the type was. introduced into the Royal Dutch Airlines fleet toward the end of last year, and the one handled by Parmentier and Moll astonished the world in the .Melbourne race. The machine is a low-winged monoplane with twin supercharged Wright Cyclone engines, each delivering 710 h.p. The undercarriage is retractable. The wing span is 85 feet, and the length 60 feet, and when loaded the machine has a total weight of 17.500 pounds. Until the last week, the Royal Dutch airlines have operated for some years with remarkable freedom from accident. Since Monday, however, the line has had three accidents, the first being the wreck of a Fokker at Amsterdam, resulting in six deaths, and the second the crash of a mailplane while taking off from Bushire on Wednesday. Commander Arthur Watts. D. 5.0.. served in the R.N.V.R. from 1914 to 1919 and was mentioned in dispatches. He took part in the Zwbrugge raid iu 191 S, for his part in which he was awarded the D.S.O. and was also at the sinking of the Vindictive in Ostend harbour less than a month later. He was a contributor of humorous drawings’ to “Punch,” “Life,” and other publications, and was the author of “A Painter’s Anthology.”

Mr. L. M. Nesbitt won wide recognition ns the result of his book “Desert and Forest.” which was published last year. It is an account of the adventures of an expedition led by him through the Abyssinian Denakil. a region from which no white man had previously conm back alive. It is regarded as a work of exceptional merit. BLOW TO HOLLAND Two Services Suspended (Received July 21. 7.30 p.m.) The Hague, July 20. The public is deeply shocked at the third disaster in a week after a long period almost without tragedy. The air line announces the suspension of the Milan service until the cause of the disaster is established. It will be operated by Lufthansa, An earlier message stated that owing to a shortage of pilots due to the two previous crashes, the K.D.M. Company will shortly close down the Amsterdam-Liverpool service. THE BUS HIRE CRASH Parmentier Picks Up Passengers

Bagdad, July 19. The famous aviator rarmen tier, after a record Hight from Amsterdam, picked up the passengers of the Dutch mailplane which crashed and was destroyed by fire at Bushire. He hopes to reach Amsterdam tomorrow. covering 7000 miles in 31 days. MID-AIR COLLISION Melbourne Pilot Killed (Received July 21, 6.30 p.m.) Melbourne, July 21. One pilot, Mr. Harry Zacker, was killed ami the other. Mr. 'Theo Allen, miraculously glided to safety when two aero club Motiis collided in midair at a turning point over Maribyrnong during a race on Saturday.

The propeller of the machine which landed safely sliced oft’ the tail and part of the fuselage of the other, causing it to drop like a stone.