EGMONT PLANE CRASH

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIV, Issue 234, 15 September 1934, Page 7

EGMONT PLANE CRASH

Two Bodies Recovered LOCATED IN A GULLY By Telegraph—Press - Association NEW PLYMOUTH, Sept. 14. The dead bodies of Stanley Green and James Austin, victims of the air crash on Mount Egmont, were round this afternoon in a gully west of the Waiwakaiho river in extremely rugged country. Death apparently was instantaneous. The bodies are being brought to New Plymouth.

Mangled by the terrific force of the crash tho wreckage of the ZK-ABS plane, which has been missing from New Plymouth airport since 2 o’clock on Thursday afternoon, was found by a party of searchers at 10.30 o’clock this morning. Under the wreckage of portion of the fuselage were the bodies of the occupants, James Austin, photographer, and S. J. Green, pilot, both well-known New Plymouth men

So completely wrecked was the plane that it is doubtful of the aerial search would ever have located it. Fragments of thu framework, fuselage, fabric, petrol tank and engine were scattered over a radius of 50 yards.

tortion of one wing was atte.hed to a tall sapling 70 yards from where tho engine lay. a few feet from the bodies of rhe flyers tattered strips oi wing and body fabric Hung item a huge rata, against which the machine had dashed itself to pieces. '1 he cas tag ot the engine was shattered by the force of the impact and lay 40 feet from a largo tree which had had its limbs lopped from tho terrific effect of the crash.

It seemed probable that the plane had dived at high speed and that the pilot had been unable to pull its nose up in time to clear the tree tops. The bodies of Austin and Green under the overturned fuselage were recognisable only by their clothing, and it is apparent that they met their death instantly.

So far experts can advance no theory as to tho cause of tho accident. The locality in which tho piano came to earth is heavily timbered and accessible only under expert guidance. It is broken by steep gorges and tangled with supplejack. The wreckage lies 200 yards above a small tributary of the Kaukauai river, on its western side.

The accident occurred at an altitude of 3000 feet. So exact had been the information supplied by trappers who had heard the crash on tho previous afternoon, Mr R. Burrows and his son, that three independent parties of searchers were converging to the one point when the discovery was made. Under exceedingly difficult conditions the bodies were carried out of the bush before dusk to-night. Tho distance from tho scene of the crash to the nearest road is about nine miles and the wild nature of the country made the task an exceedingly arduous one. Cold showers following a brilliant morning added to tho unpleasantness of tho work.

Overnight large parties had been carefully organised to begin a search by air and on foot. With break of day a cold mis’, soon began to creep down the mountain side, but aeroplanes succeeded in locating portion of the piano in the trees and in assisting the ground parties.