MISSING ANTARCTIC FLYERS

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 15, 18 January 1936, Page 9

MISSING ANTARCTIC FLYERS

ELLSWORTH AND KENYON ON BOARD DISCOVERY II

PICKED UP BY AEROPLANE

(British Official Wireless.) (Received January 18, 11 a.m.) RUGBY, January 17. - Messages were received in London today from the British research ship Discovery II announcing the finding alive and well of the American airman Lincoln Ellsworth and his pilot Herbert Hollick-Kenyon, who have been missing in the Antarctic for two months. The messages were at once communicated to the American Embassy. Kenyon, whose mother lives in Canada, is a Londoner, and his uncle is at present Mayor of Paddington. Earlier messages recorded the sighting of a man at the base at Little America from one of the Discovery's aeroplanes and the subsequent meeting of the ship's party with Kenyon, who returned to the ship and reported that his companion was alive but suffering from a slight cold. The latest message received announces that another ship's party, returned last night with Mr. Ellsworth. Long Silence Explained. The Discovery's messages also say that the airmen state they ran out of petrol 20 miles from the base and sledged in, and were unable to report as the transmitter switch caused a radio failure. The finding of the lost airmen, for whose safety hopes had been gradually failing, has caused a sensation, and the newspapers comment on the coincidence that the rescue has been carried out by the same British research ship which almost exactly two years ago similarly interrupted a scientific expedition in an emergency and took a doctor to Admiral Byrd, who was ill in the Antarctic. Missing Since November 24. Until these messages were received from the Discovery n nothing had been heard of Mr. Ellsworth and his companion since their last wireless message on November 24. They had set out on the previous day from Dundee Island, Graham's Land, in the aeroplane Polar Star to fly 2000 miles across the Antarctic to Admiral Byrd's base at Little America, where it had been arranged that the base ship Wyatt Earp, commanded by Sir Hubert Wilkins, should pick the party up between January 22 and 25. The Wyatt Earp is now reported 420 miles away. < The Royal research ship Discovery II left London on October 3 for work in Antarctic waters and while on her*way was ordered to assist in the search for the missing airmen. She put into Melbourne and took on board two aeroplanes equipped with wireless, floats, and skis, and sailed for the Bay of Whales, from which the present wireless messages have been received. Mr. Ellsworth's aeroplane carried enough fuel for 20 hours' flying and food sufficient to last for eight weeks.