A FATAL SMASH.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 30 July 1927, Page 5

A FATAL SMASH.

FAMOUS AVIATOR KILLED. WHILE TESTING RACING MACHINE. BY CABLE—PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT. LONDON, uly 28. Barnard, a famous flyer, was killed near Bristol while testing a racer intended to fly for the King’s Cup. Engine trouble developed, and the machine banked, nose-dived, fell 100 feet and was smashed, Barnard receiving i-;r----riblo injuries whicli caused bis death. Barnard was one of tlie finest air navigators in tlie world. He nod already twice won tlie King’s Cup. He navigated by the most up-to-date and scientific methods, and where mauy pilots preferred, when possible, to depend on landmarks, Barnard used instruments and calculations only. He habitually flow on the assumption there were no landmarks to guide him, and thus flew safely in cloud and fog. As senior pilot in the Imperial Airways, he was most careful, but took plenty of risks in war-time whdn engaged in day and night bombing. He had flown throughout Europe in a hundred different types of machines, and had flown more than half a million miles in cross-channel journeys.

Among his exploits were his flight from Paris to London above the clouds, without once seeing the ground after the tairt off. He journeyed from Croydon to Cologne in one day and covered 840 miles round Britain at an average speed over .150 miles an hour.