TOLL OF OCEAN FLIGHTS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 18 January 1928, Page 4

TOLL OF OCEAN FLIGHTS.

MANx FAILURES OCVUB. SERIOUS LOSS UF Lll-E. Against the successful trans-ocean flights must be set a- largo number of .allures, many attended with sor.ous loss of life, especially during 1927. Following is a list 01 the major undertakings which have come to grie. : Hairy G. Haw ken and Lieut.-Com-mander Mackenzie Grieve attempted a non-stop transatlantic fight from Newfoundland to Ireland on May IS, 1919. They flew 1225 miles box ore they were forced to- alight in the sea 850 miles from Ireland. The fliers were not heard oi lor six days, and were given up for lost, but were picked up oy a Danish steamer and saiely landed.

Captain John Lodgers, with a crew of four men in a large machine, attempted a non-stop flight from SanFrano sco to Hawaii in 1925. He came down en route, and after being missing for several days was picked up by a submarine.

Disasters in the Atlantic

Captain de Saint-Roman, with Commander Aiouneyres, Eft Marseilles on April 17, 1927, in a Farman seaplane ior Buenos Aires. At Casablanca the floats of. the inach.ne were replaced with wheels. The French Department of Aeronautics objected to this and ordered the flight to be abandoned, but the two officers persisted. They set oft from Saint-Louis, Senegal, on May 5. for Pernambuco, • Brazil, taking a mechanic with them. Nothing more was heard until .June 20, when fragments of a much..lie believed to be theirs were washed up on the Brazilian i oast.

Captain N ungesser, the -famous French ace, and All Coli, attempted a westward transatlantic flight, leaving Le Boiuget early on May 8, 1927. With 104 hours of daylight they hoped to make a binding at Cape Race, Newfoundland. and follow the coast to New York. Their machine was an aeroplane with a watertight fuselage. Fog and storms were afterwards reported over the Atlantic, and in spite of many days’ search both at sea and in the interior of Newfoundland and the mainland. no trace of the machine was found.

Tnc jCR’bOO prize offered bv Mr Dole for an air race from Oakland, California. to Hawaii, led to the loss, last year, of three machines and the lives of. six men and one woman Five machines set out, but one came early to grief. The Golden Eagle, with Messrs. Jack Frost and Gordon Scoot, and the Miss Doran, with Miss Mildred Doran and Messrs .1. A. Pedlar and V. R. Knope, were lost. A third tnaelt ne. containing Messrs. W. O. Erwin and A H. Efehwaldt, which flew from Oakland two days later, in search of the missing planes, was never heard of again. Two competing machines reached their destination.

hate of a Princess

Paul Redfern left Georgia, Brunswick, on August 25, 1927. in the plane Port of Brunswick, in an attempt to fly to Brazil. He was last teen by a Norwegian steamer on August. 20 within 165 miles of the coast of South

America, when he was heading toward the mainland of Venezuela. Captain Lesl.e Hamilton, Lieut.Colonel Alin chin and Princess Lowcn-stein-Wojtheim left Wiltshire on September 1, 1927, in the monoplane St. Raphael to fly to Ottawa. The attempt at the transatlantic flight from East to West, previously accomplished only by the dirigible R-34, in 1919, failed, and ai-iators and their machine were never found. Captain Terry Tully and Lieut. James Metcalf set out on a. flight from London, Ontario, to London, Itngtaudin the monoplane Sir John Carlnlg on .'September 7, 1927. The machine was not heard of after passing Harbour Grace, Newfoundland. Mr Lloyd Bertrand, Mr James do. W.itt Hill, and Air Phillip Payne, a New York journalist, left Alaine on September (>, 1927, in the monoplane Old Glory, bound for Rome. The steamer ivyle found the wreckage of the machine 650 miles off New foundluncl. but the men were never found. Rescue from Burning Plane. Miss Ruth Elder and Captain George Haldernmnn, wiio left New York for Paris on October 11, 1927, in tlic American Girl, were forced down about 60J miles from the Azores. Both aviators were picked up by the Dutch .steamer Barendrecht while their plane was burning. The German seaplane R 1220, which was being used for a rlight across tne Atlantic to New York, came down oft the Azores on November 13, 1927. The airmen jumped into the sea, and were picked up by a motor-boat. Airs. Frances Grayson, Lieut. Oscar Omdal, of the Norwegian Navy, the pilot, Air Brice Goldsborough, navigation and radio engineer, and Air Fred Koehler left New York in the aeroplane Dawn on December 23, 1.927, ior Harbour Grace, Newfoundland, from where it was intended to attempt a flight across the Atlantic. They were not heard of again, but a tramp steamer reported hearing the sound of an aeroplane engine, hollowed by a splash.