INSPECTION BY AIR

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23672, 2 December 1938, Page 7

INSPECTION BY AIR

BACKBLOCK HILL COUNTRY ADJUSTMENT COMMISSION USES • Per United Pres- Association* BLENHEIM. Dec. 1. The advantages of the use of the aeroplane in carrying out inspections of backblock hill country were demonstrated this morning, when the Marlborough Aero Club’s Waco cabin machine was chartered by the Marlborough No. 2 Adjustment Commission for the purpose of examining several properties in the Sounds district.

In the ordinary course visits to the areas concerned by launch or on foot would have occupied at least two days, but by air over 200 miles were covered in Ihr 45min, and a more comprehensive investigation was possible than otherwise would have been the case. The members of the commission— Messrs G. M. Spence, A. R. Graham and E. Reid—in a plane piloted by E. F. Holdaway, took off from Blenheim and flew over Queen Charlotte, Pelorus, and Kenepuru Sounds, circling the properties several times at a low altitude. From the air they found it possible to gain a very much better idea of the class of country comprised in the properties involved than would have been possible by clambering over them on foot. The distinction between the different classes of land was very marked. One thing that unfavourably impressed the commission was the evidence of extensive slipping and erosion in some parts of the sound that have been denuded of bush.