FATAL COLLISION

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19125, 21 September 1936, Page 5

FATAL COLLISION

CAMPBELL BLACK KILLED SMASH IN GIFT MACHINE AFRICAN AIR RACE ENTRY PLANES MEET ON GROUND (Elec. Tel.'Copyright—United Press Assn.) LONDON, Sept, 20. In the aviation equivalent of a pushbike collision, the noted pilot, Mr. T. Campbell Black, was fatally injured at the Speke aerodrome, Liverpool, in Miss Liverpool, a plane presented to the city in order to participate in the Johannesburg air race under Mr; Black’s pilotage by a local business man, Mr. John Moore, who was giving a party at the aerodrome •when the accident occurred yesterday. Mr. Black had completed a test flight and had landed safely. • He climbed into the plane again in order to take olf for Gravesend to undertake final preparations for the South African flight. Mr.' Black then taxied' the plane preparatory to rising when he collided with a large Royal Air Force instructional Hawker Hart returning after a flight and also taxi-ing. Neither pilot apparently was aware of the proximity of the other, MACHINES INTERLOCKED The Hawker Hart, just -before the impact, swung in to turn, but was too late and 1 the machines interlocked and stopped. The crew.of the Hawker Hart jumped out uninjured, but Mr. Campbell Black was lifted dying from the cockpitHo was severely injured on the left side, including a head injury and a punctured lung. An eye-witness said that both planes were taxi-ing at 15 miles per hour. The weather was misty and overcast and the white body and black wings of Mr. Campbell Black’s machine apparently reduced the visibility, preventing the air force pilot perceiving the other machine. Suddenly either or both the machines swerved, the Hawker Hart piling itself on top of Mr. Campbell Black’s little plane.

The designer of Mr. Campbell Black’s machine, Captain Percival, was greatly shocked. He referred to the irony of fate overtaking Mr. Campbell Black after his escape from the perils of previous dangerous flights.

His partner in the 1934 race to Melbourne, Mr. C. W. A. Scott, broadcasting, sounded a similar note, adding that it was impossible to be cooped up in a small aeroplane for three days and nights with a man and struggling together to achieve a definite goal and not learn to know, respect and love him.

A noted British long-distance flyer, Mr. T. Campbell Black was known to lame principally as the co-pilot of Mr. C. \V. A. Scott in the Comet which won the race from Mildenhall, England, to Melbourne in October of 1934, completing the journey in 2 days 22 hours 58 minutes, and secured the prize of a gold cup and £IO,OOO. Mr. Campbell Black served in the Royal Naval Air Service and Royal Air Force during the Great War. When he was working for Wilson Airways, in Africa, in 1929, he flew from Nairobi to Londpn in eight days. In 1931 he completed a 1600-mile flight linking up the four capitals of the British dependencies in East Africa in one day. Altogether he had flown between England and Nairobi 13 times. When the Prince of Wales was in Africa, Mr. Campbell Black was pilot for his big game expedition. THREE BURNT TO DEATH CRASH NEAR CARDIFF TRAGIC STUNT FLIGHT PLANE DOWN IN FLAMES (Reed. Sept. 21, 11 a.m.) LONDON, Sept. 20. Stunting near Cardiff, a dozen yards from the home of A. Elhvell, one of the victims an aeroplane containing Maurice Keen and G. Berg and Mr. Ellw r ell looped into telegraph wires and crashed in a field. The machine burst into flames. The occupants, who are members of the Cardiff Aero Club, were burnt to death, the heat defying the attempts of spectators and firebrigadesmen to rescue them.

The family of Mr. Ellwcll witnessed the tragedy.