PARACHUTIST KILLED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18297, 13 January 1923, Page 2 (Supplement)

PARACHUTIST KILLED.

A MAN WHO THRILLED. Well known for a couple of thrilling aerial performances, Professor; W. Newell. parachute expert, of London, met a tragic fate while giving a demonstration flight In Denmark. He had been touring that country, giving exhibitions of descents' in "Guardian Angel" parachutes, and /it was during a' performance; near the Island of Aeroe that he was killed. He ascended in an aeroplane, hut \ when ■ the time came to; jump he failed to dear the machine and was left hanging underneath it. The pilot, noticing his danger/ steered out over- the i sea, and at tim peril of his own life brought the aeroplane down sharply in a vain effort to pave the parachutist. .■' When the machine had descended" to within 600 ft. ■;? of the surface the professor either fell exhausted or misjudged the distance and jumped into ,6ft. of water. A motor-boat went -to the • rescue immediately, but: he waa dead. ' ; :->"■:; i ' ; ' : * * "

Mr. Newell, : who resided at Harrow, was one of the. parachute pioneer*. /He was nearly 60, and ; had spent most of his life making experimental balloon '.': ascents and parachute descents. : Twentythree years ago he gave" public demonstrations at Alexandra Palace ■ ■ which thrilled London, shooting up in a hoaxed gas balloon and coming down leisurely from 5000 ft. in & parachute of his own 'invention. In 1914 ha was the first to make a parachute descent from an aeroplane in England. 4 This was at Hendon, when ha jumped from : a Grahame-White biplane at a height of i 2000 ft. and landed in 2min. 22seo. v lAter he made ; a 'double descent by jumping from ah aeroplane 200Gft. up, cutting the ropes of the parachute, and being pulled up after li, drop like a stone, by a second parachute;; '' •.