ORDEAL IN FLYING-BOAT IN SEA

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22464, 20 October 1947, Page 5

ORDEAL IN FLYING-BOAT IN SEA

CHILDREN SCREAM IN STORM SURVIVORS’ GRAPHIC PICTURE (N.Z.P.A.—Eeuter— Copyright.) (ItSO a.m.) NEW YORK, Oct. 19. y The screams of babies and children, “tearing every mother’s heart to pieces,” during their ordeal on the crippled flying boat Bermuda Queen as it tossed on the stormy Atlantic on October 14, were described by the rescued passengers who arrived at Boston today on the rescue ship Bibb.

Mrs Albert Hichie, of Andover, New Brunswick, said: “Every creak of the plane and every sound of the sea told us that it was too late to hope that we and our babies would be saved.

“Our three-year-old son Gordon, spent hours on his father’s knee watching the waves pounding the plane. If any women and children had been left aboard during the night when the rescue operations were postponed, I believe I and all the other women would probably have gone mad. “During the day when rescue seemed almost hopeless, one little by kept waking with a screem crying: get me off the plane’. His mother would soothe him and he would fall asleep only to wake screaming over and over again. “A woman’s scream would have sei us off, but a baby’s scream just tore every mother’s heart to pieces All day we sat too full of despair to rno-ve. We couldn’t show fear to our children.