BLACK WEEK FOR DUTCH AVIATION

Northern Advocate, 22 July 1935, Page 5

BLACK WEEK FOR DUTCH AVIATION

THIRD DISASTER ROYAL LINE MACHINE CRASH IN SWITZERLAND. LOSS OF THIRTEEN LIVES. Wnited Press Association —By Electric Telegraph.—-Copyright.] (Received 9 a.m.) , MILAN, July 20/ The third machine of the Royal Dutch Air Line to meet with, disaster within a week is the Ph-A.K.G. of the ' “Flying Hotel” type. The aeroplane was en route from Milan to Frankfurt, when it crashed near San Bernardino, Switzerland, during a severe .storm. The thirteen occupants were killed. Nine were passengers, who included two Britons. The others were Dutch. The cause of the disaster is not known, i A telegram from Berne says the two British passengers who were killed were Commander Arthur Watts and Mr Louis Mariano Nesbitt, mining engineer, and author of romantic books on Abyssinia, where he had many adventures while travelling. in districts | from which while men formerly had | not returned alive. Captain Watts-- |

was hastening from Italy, to rejoin:, his wife, who recently gave birth to a son. An official of the Air Line Company states that the pilot Van der Veist, when crossing the frontier of Switzerland, encountered a fog and asked for his bearings from Milan 15 minutes before the crash. Then he wound in the aerial owing tp a thunderstorm. Impact With Mountain. The pilot flew the machine out of the clouds and found it was too near the ground. Therefore, he attempted to climb up through the clouds, but collided with the side of a mountain. Villagers at San Bernardino state that the plane crashed into a pine forest which clothed a deep ravine. The impact was of such violence that debris was flung upward. Later, the propeller was found embedded in a tree 50 yards distant. Rescuers rushed to the spot. They found all the occupants of the liner dead, except Mdlle. Hermanides, V the first of four stewardesses recently engaged, who was making her first trip from Holland. She was; hastily extricated, but died a few minutes later. A, message from The Hague says the public are deeply shocked at this third disaster in a week, after a long.period almost free from tragedy. The Royal / Dutch; Air' Line announces suspension of the Milan service until the cause of the disaster has been established. No service will be operated by the Lufthansa Company. DROPPED LIKE A STONE COLLISION SEQUEL. ONE PILOT KILLED. OTHER’S MIRACULOUS ESCAPE. MELBOURNE, July 21. One pilot, Harry Zacker, was killed, arid another, Then Alien, miraculously glided to safety when two Aero :Club Moths collided in mid-air at the turning point over Maribyrnong during a race yesterday. The propeller of the machine which landed safely, sliced off the tail and part of the fuselage of the other one, causing it to drop like a stone. THE TRAGEDY IN PERSIA. PARMENTIER’S FINE . .FEAT. (Received 11 a.m.) BAGDAD, July: 19. K. Parmentier, the : noted Dutch flier, who left Amsterdam, in a Duoglas plane to pick up the passengers of the crashed KiL.M. air liner, reached here after , a record flight. He hopes to reach Amsterdam tomorrow, when he will have covered 7,000 miles in three and a half days. An Amsterdam message says that owing to the shortage of pilots, due to two recent crashes, the K.L.M. will shortly close down the Amsterdam— Liverpool service.