AIR FATALITY

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 22 December 1937, Page 8

AIR FATALITY

CRASH NEAR ROXGOTAI EVIDENCE AT INQUEST IBy Telegraph Press Association! WELLINGTON, This Day. A finding that Ridley Lenderyou Elliott, aged 22 years, of Palmerston North, died at the Wellington Hospital on 3rd December from multiple injuries sustained through the Manawatu and Middle Districts’ Aero Club's Moth plane ZK-APV crashing near Rongotai Aerodrome on the same date, was given by the Coroner, Mr Gilbertson, at the inquest to-day. William Smillie, the pilot, a clerk aged 19 yearsTlhp holder of an A License. said that after asking the deceased what conditions were like on the trip from Palmerston North, he removed from the luggage locker a canvas bundle containing screw pickets and rope, and placed a suitcase in the locker. He told deceased, who was going to sit in the front scat, that the pickets would have to be carried in the front cockpit, and placed the bundle on the front seat He did not know how deceased disposed of it. A second cushion out of the pilot’s seat was also given to deceased. Witness fastened his safety belt, and as far as he knew deceased did the same, as witness asked him through the inter-cockpit phone. The engine was not stopped during the seven to ten minutes the plane was on the ground. They took off and the engine revolutions afterwards showed 1850 to the minute. At 150 to 200 feet he eased the throttle back and made a fiat climbing turn to the left. The airspeed indicator then showed the speed as 58 to 60 miles an hour. He completed an 180 degree turn and started to adjust the tail trimming gear. He was easing the lever of the trimming gear back when the machine seemed to tip suddenly with the left wing down He could not recall what action he then took, but remembered seeing the ground directly over the nose of the machine. The next thing he could recall was struggling to free his right foot after the crash. Fie then recalled going forward to try to move a wing off deceased, but the wing would not shift. He looked back and saw the machine starting to burn just behind the pilot's cockpit. He had never before flown at Rongotai. He took off in the same way as he saw deceased come in. Most of his training had been done in that machine, and he had flown before with a passenger 'and luggage. Stanley David Ross aged 21 years, who saw the plane as it was about to crash, gave evidence of being the first there. He saw the pilot climbing out and completed the task of releasing deceased, who was strapped in and unconscious, just as the flames began to show.

An official inquiry is to be held on 24th January.