FIRE AND AIR

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 8681, 14 March 1914, Page 9

FIRE AND AIR

AVIATOR’S TRAGIC ADVENTURE DAUCOURT’S THRILLING WRECK ON TAURUS. The aviator Daucourt, who was wrecked in Asia Minor on his way to Cairo, has given a graphic description of his experiences to “L’Opinion.” On December 18th he sat down- and looked ■with apprehension at tho frowning face of the Taurus, and as the weather was growing daily worse decided to cross at once by himself, sending his passenger Roux by road. This is his account of what followed; —

“I rose easily and quickly in the cold grey morning, but at 7500 ft 1 met the clouds, aud it was impossible to go higher, as I could see nothing and should inevitably have come to smash against some invisible crag, So I took to coasting a few yards below this wet wall, like a fly running along the central rafter of a ceiling. 1 had to find a valley, as I was not high enough to fly over the whole rocky range. Soon I saw an opening' in the cliffs opposite —a sort of gulf, the rest of which was hidden by the fog. After making sure that I was in a valley that the German railway was going to use I plunged in, but scarcely bad I done so when a terrific air current carried me forward. Later I learned this was the wind from the great salt lake, a plain of thousands of square miles, which blew up against the Taurus, and, finding only one opening, tore down it in fury. I was flying at full speed of about 66 miles an hour, but the wind took me along at double that rate (afterwards ho verified this fantastic speed). I soon lost all control of the levers, and was whirled along like a scrap of paper, sometimes on one wing and sometimes on another, seeing the landscape- changing beneath mo with prodigious rapidity. So I went madly on, always stuck to the roof of .cloud, which seemed slowly to come hearer to tho ground. The valley was trending upwards, and I was being caught in a bind air-alley—impossible to land, and impossible to rise. Then came the forced landing after turning his machine head to the wind, and being caught by a side current from the Mediterranean. Choosing the woodiest place be could be came down at sixty miles an hour against a tree, whose trunk was sheared off, hut which brought up the monoplane fifty yards further. When Daucourt came to his senses he was still in his seat and uninjured, though his machine was a good deal damaged. His first idea was to seek help, and he soon found a party of German railway men, who gave him a kind reception and undertook to repair his monoplane. Feeling rather knocked up and downhearted, he needed sleep more than anything else, but seeing a gendarme he showed him a letter from Enver Bey, and took him up to where the wrecked machine lay. Here he explained tb him as best he could the danger of lighting a fire, or even a match, anywhere near, and drawing a wide circle round the debris ordered this to be tabod, which the pandour promised to guard. With a quiet conscience Daucourt then went to sleep till he was awakened by a terrified peasant. “One© more I climbed up, most anxious for the fate of my poor monoplane. When 1 reached the plateau it was burning itself out, as were the legs of a poor devil watching it. But it was not my gendarme. Fearjng the - cold he had gone away delegating his duty to a shepherd. But he had forgotten to explain the magic circle, or the danger of fire. The unfortunate wretch had therefore ensconced himself in the fuselage, and built up a fire between the wings very carefully before composing himself to rest, only to wake surrounded by flames. At bis agonised cries for help his brother, also' a shepherd, had come to call me. “I confess I was overwhelmed with despair, and could not even think of the unfortunate victim. I only saw one thing—my dream vanished, and all my efforts rendered useless by the stupidity of a gendarme I And I was foolish enough to draw my revolver to put an end to my adventures then and there before the heap of ruins that had been my monoplane. The railway men who had run up after me prevented me, and led me away, and I was so tired that I went again to sleep. I afterwards heard that the gendarmerie lieutenant and his men had been thrown into prison, but that was no consolation, for I also heard that the shepherd had died. And I shall never forget the flames in the night on the forest-clad sides of the Taurus.”