Winter Flying Hazards

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 811, 4 November 1929, Page 9

Winter Flying Hazards

PILOT DROWNED UNDER ICE Eielson and Companion Overdue PARTY OF EIGHT LOST IN CANADA United P.A.—By Telegraph—Copyright Received 11 a.m. VANCOUVER. Sunday. THE hazardous nature of winter airplaning' in Canada's frozen north was illustrated by a dramatic fatality at Mayo, on the southern edge of the Canadian Klondike. About the same hour, news came of the disappearance of two Alaskan Airways planes, piloted by Frank Derbrnclt and Lieutenant Carl B. Eielson, famous companion of Sir Hubert Wilkins in his dash across the North Pole.

The first.plane was taking off along the bank of Stewart River on an ice

runway, and it had risen only a few feet when is suddenly fell. Pilot Patterson, who had not the slightest chance of extricating himself, was drowned when the plane sank beneath the ice. Several planes have been operating between Mayo and Skagway, accomplishing in five hours, trips which would occupy weeks for dog-teams. Lieutenant Eielson and Derbandt are long overdue from Nome, Alaska, to East Cape, Siberia, where they expected to pick up six passengers and

a valuable cargo. It is feared that heavy snowstorms forced the planes

down. The McAlpine party of eight flyers is still missing in the Hudson’s Bay country. Two planes with a millionaire and mining men disappeared eight weeks ago into the frozen north, and a search has been made by planes, which have flown. 100,000 miles, but not the slightest sign of them has been seen. The supposition is that the planes landed at some remote lake, and that they have been frozen solid and are unable to move. The flyers probably are already starved to death.