NO WORD OF ’PLANE

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVII, Issue 237, 3 September 1927, Page 10

NO WORD OF ’PLANE

SECOND EDITION

MISSING ST, RAPHAEL. CANADIAN COAST COMBED. DESCENT IN ATLANTIC FEARED. (By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) Received September -3, 1.10 p.m. RUGBY, Sept. 1. There is still no news of the St. Raphael monoplane. The Canadian Marine Department states that the whole of the Canadian coast as far as 300 miles north of Belle Island has been combed, but all the radio stations have reported absolutely no word of the ’plane. It is considered more likely now that the machine has been compelled to descond in the Atlantic. Almost exactly in the middle of the Atlantic and in the northern area, through which the St. Raphael would attempt to fly. there developed to-day a very marked centre of bad weather. This would mean that, for an area of at least 600 miles on the probable route, strong winds were blowing, with clouds and rain. In a rough sea the collapsible boat ■ which the St. Raphael carried would bo launched with difficulty and could probably be kept afloat only with great skill and effort. But there is the clianco of the fliers being observed and picked up by fishing boats, many or which do not carry wireless, so that several days might pass without news reaching England. It is recalled that when the late well-known aviator, Hawker and his companion were picked up in the Atlantic in 1919 by a steamer without wireless it was a week before news of their safety was- announced. —British official wireless.

The British airmen, Colonel Minchin and Captain Leslie Hamilton, accompanied by Princess Loewenstein-Wertbeim, lott Upavon in Wiltshire, at half-past seven morning ir. the Fokker monoplane St. Raphael on an attempt to fly across the Atlantic to Ottawa. Princess LoewensteinWertheim is the firet woman to .fly the Atlantic. She is an Englishwoman by birth, being tho daughter of tho fourth Earl of Mexborough, her maiden name being Lady Anne S&vilo. She married in 1897 tho Germain Prince LoewcnsteinWertheim, who was killed two years later fighting for the Spaniards against tile Americans in the Philippines.