LOCAL & GENERAL

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 52, Issue 3282, 30 June 1943, Page 4

LOCAL & GENERAL

£lBO On Account As the result of the visit of the Regimental Band of the U.S. Marines Corp to Thames during the week-end, the organiser of the visit, Mr C. Lidington, has handed the secretary of

the Thames Borough Inter-zone Patriotic Committee, Mr J. F. Eames, the sum of £lBO- on account. Flying Fortress in Storm

A fierce storm, accompanied by high seas and freezing rain, struck the lslands on May 1. It caught, in its passage, a Flying Fortress returning from a bombing mission on a Japanese supply base. With petrol running low, the pilot, First Lieutenant Ralph J. Soucy, of Saco, Maine, was forced to make an emergency landing on the water a long way from home. To the immense satisfaction of the crew, the Fortress stayed afloat for almost 15 minutes. “I knew she wouldn’t let us down,” said one of the men as they got busy salvaging a radio and supplies after launching their rubber boats. The radio meant salvation. With it they called for help, but not before they had spent the following day, a Sunday, and two nights in the boats.