SEQUEL TO CRASH

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 69, 18 September 1937, Page 25

SEQUEL TO CRASH

CASE AGAINST PILOT

REHEARD

CONVICTED ON ONE CHARGE

(By Teleeraph—Press Association.)

INVERCARGILL, September 17,

I The rehearing of the case in which Arthur John Bradshaw was convicted last Friday by Mr. W. H. Freeman, S.M., of having on December 30. 1936. failed to satisfy • himself before commencing a flight that the aircraft was safely loaded for flight and having used an unlicensed landing ground, was completed in the Magistrate's Court this morning.

The defendant, who was represented by Mr. B. W. Hewat, pleaded not guilty, and elected to-be dealt with summarily:

Mr. H. J. Macalister, who prosecuted, said that by agreemert evidence taken in the previous proceedings was admitted arid deemed to have been taken in the present proceedings. _ . Mr Hewat said he agreed, but asked that the objections made pre-. viously by Mr R B Bahnerman stand in the present hearing. "The position is an unusual one, continued Mr Hewat addressing ,tne Court. "Your pronouncement was made at the earlier hearing and the defendant is in the position of appellant from that pronouncement. I submit that your Worship misdirected yourself in the interpretation of the regulations. On the merits of the case the defendant should not be convicted of either offence." Counsel then dealt with the charge oi using an unlicensed ground while plying for hire, and Said the regulation under which the defendant had been convicted was directed obviously at proprietors or licensees of landing grounds and not against pilots. A pilot was entitled to make a casual landing on any ground and committed an offence only if he made it a regular place of landing. Bradshaw should not have been convicted under regulation 10. If his actions were contrary to the regulations, then he should have been charged under regulation 7. It was the first time he had landed at Big Bay when carrying fare-paying passengers.

Mr. Macalister said the opinion of the pilot must be based on reasonable premises—that was the whole kernel of the matter—but the case for the Crown was that he did not do so. The defendant had ■ failed to satisfy him-; self that the machine was satisfactorily loaded. He did not weigh or take adequate steps to find the true weights of the passengers. He had also estimated the weight of the luggage. He submitted that the defendant knew the load was up near the maximum for he took out a can of petrol. There was no room for argument that the proper step to take was to weigh every item. As to the other charge, if Mr Hewat's submission were correct, it would be a most extraordinary state of affairs, for it would mean a pilot could land anywhere in New Zealand. That'was opposed to the whole intention of the' regulations.

The defendant was convicted on the charge of failing to satisfy himself that the aircraft was safely loaded, the charge of using an unlicensed, landing ground being dismissed.