Task of Searchers Increased by Snow And Poor Visibility

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26916, 30 October 1948, Page 6

Task of Searchers Increased by Snow And Poor Visibility

P.A, , AUCKLAND, Oct. 30. The wreckage of the missing Lockheed Electra airliner Kaka was discovered this morning about 700 feet from the summit of Mount Ruapehu. This was the first day since its disappearance on Saturday that visibility was reasonably fair. There was no sign of fire in the area. Any hope of survivors is only a very faint one, but medical supplies have been dropped near the spot in case some may have managed to survive the crash and the bitter conditions. Snow has covered the area for some days. Planes have also dropped stretchers and cameras at the scene. While in the air, constant wireless contact is maintained with the Karioi landing field, which is acting as a relay control point for messages to the Wellington Air Department headquarters and also maintains contact between the planes and the searching ground party.

Scanning the southern and south- ■ western slopes of Mount Ruapehu from a Fox Moth aircraft of the Auckland Aero Club, a reporter and photographer of the New Zealand Herald gained first-hand experience of the dangers and difficulties of mountain flying during the afternoon. A 50-knot wind was whipping snow from the lip of the summit crater and a fierce downdraught of air made it impossible for the light but sturdy aircraft to gain a higher altitude than 7000 feet. The plane tossed hnd twisted violently in the freakish air currents and at one ; stage was moving crab-wise up the I side of the mountain. until the rudder and ailerons again gained control. Even from the air the problems 1

’faced by ground parties in reaching the scene of the crash were apparent. No country could be wilder. _ more broken, more forbidding that this serrated mountainside where a mile of hard tramping might mean an ascent of a bare 100 feet. In contrast to the hazards of circling the mountain in the tricky wind conditions, the only misadventure to the Herald aircraft came when the Fox Moth was almost within sight of its home field at Mangere. Then the motor cut out without warning while the aircraft was crossing Manukau. A skilful forced landing was made by the pilot, Mr John Kay, in a paddock several miles away from the McLachlan homestead, near Papatoetoe.