“MELANCHOLY TOLL”

Grey River Argus, 19 February 1945, Page 2

“MELANCHOLY TOLL”

BRITISH AIR ACCIDENTS (Rec. 8.30) LONDON, Feb. 16 ' In the House of Commons Mr. Quentin Hogg expressed growing disquiet about what he termed “the melancholy, mounting toll of air accidents among persons carried by our Transport Command and kindred services.” Mr. Hogg, in a speech, revealed that Marshal Maitland Wilson had suffered an accident, which nearly proved fatal owing to insufficient landing arrangements. Sir A. Sinclair (Air Minister), in reply said that the Transport Command had carried nearly five hundred thousand passengers yearly. The number was rising. The chance of the passengers meeting with a fatal accident worked out, on current experience at. one-thirtieth of one per cent. During a recent period when the Transport Command planes flew 37,500 miles, only eleven’ accidents occurred involving death and serious injury. That was one such accident for every thirty-five hundred thousand mileS.