CRASH IN MID-AIR

Taranaki Daily News, 21 December 1929, Page 9

CRASH IN MID-AIR

MOCK BATTLE SENSATION. DESCENT BY PARACHUTES. London, Nov. 14. The Royal Air Force singlc-seatci fighting machines belonging to No. 32 Squadron, Kenley, collided when engaged in a mock battle over Wallington, Surrey, on November 7, and crashed, one of them in flames. The pilots —FlyingOflicci - Collins and Sergeant White—made daring parachute leaps from a height estimated at from 3000 ft to 5000 ft., and landed safely. Flying-Officer Collins came down on a piece of waste ground near Croydon Aerodrome, nearly a mile from wlicre his machine crashed, and Sergeant White landed in a cemetery at Beddington. The former was helped to rise by a local shopkeeper, to whom he declared that his main purpose was to get back to Kenley in order to fly again as quickly as possible. By saving their lives by parachutes, tl airmen automatically become members of tho Caterpillar Club. For two airmen to become members through the same accident is unique. Thirty lives in ”’e Royal Air Force have been saved by parachutes. Ono blazing machine fell -on two houses and, fortunately, none of the occupants was at home. Tho front of one house was almost demolished, and a hole was torn in the roof. A detached petrol tank fell on a house and demolish d a bedroom. The owner, her sister, and her two-year-old baby were in at the time, but they escaped injury. It so happened that the disaster was witnessed from the air by Major C. C. Turner, aviation correspondent of the Dailv Telegraph. He writes: — • In a comfortable cabin of a Jpnkers G 23, belonging to th<T Air Express Company, at a height of 1200 ft., enjoying the rarely permitted luxury of smoking in an aeroplane, and aJble to converse without shouting, I was not in tho frame of mind to expect a glimpse of tragedy. When it came it was difficult to believe the evidence of my senses. At my side was an artist pencilling in a skctching-book his impressions of landscape and cloudscape. Just before we went up we had seen a flight of three Royal Air Force single-seater fighters—“Gamecocks’ apparently—in formation, flying south-westerly at a height of about 4000 ft. But I had forgotten them. Suddenly one of our four passengers exclaimed: “They collided!” Looking steadily I dould see that to each parachute descending a man was suspended, and I knew that each had escaped from extreme peril by means of the “lifebelt of tho air.” Each man, almost in the instant of the collision, had. thrown himself out of the wrecked machine, dropped clear, and then had pulled the grip at his waist, thus permitting the parachute to fill out in the rush of air. They were floating gently down, their only danger now due to the possibility in that populous region of falling on to houses, or glass, or being dragged over rough ground. We were slowly circling and I did not instantly catch sight again of tho abandoned machines. Then I saw only one of them, and it was now . descending in a flat spin, probably with damaged controls, and in that manner it plunged headlong into a house. 1 cannot say for certain whether this machine was on firo before it struck, but. the moment it hit the house and crashed flames leaped up and dark smoke poured out. This we watched for some time. Tho parachutes now looked very tiny in tho distance, but one appeared to touch ground safely close to a cemetery. Tho other disappeared from my view beyond some trees.—Auckland Herald Correspondent.