DIVE TO DEATH

Taranaki Daily News, 6 February 1931, Page 8

DIVE TO DEATH

FLYING BOAT DISASTER

NINE KILLED AT PLYMOUTH ONLY THREE SURVIVORS STRUCK WATER AT 60 M.P.H. MEN TRAPPED IN FUSELAGE

By Telegraph—Press Assn. —Copyright. Rec. 5.5 p.m. London, Feb. 4. Nine were killed to-day when the Royal Air Force Blackburn Iris tripleengined flying-boat attached. .to the Mountbatten air station with twelve aboard crashed in Plymouth Sound. The machine struck the water with terrific force, <aii explosion following. The victims included the pilot, WingCommander C. Tucker, who was trapped in the cabin and quickly drowned. Horrified witnesses saw the flyingboat'crash 150 yards from shore, (They quickly rushed to the spot.- It is believed the pilot descending mistook the water level owing to the sun m his eyes. Diving operations were begun. Those killed are the pilot of the machine (Wing-Commander Tucker), Fly ing-Officer Wood, Sergeant-Pilot E Wil son, Leading Air Craftsman W. Stark, L. Oates, M. Ongley, W. Rutledge, V. Stevens and C. Davies. Two officers were injured, one of them seriously. A non-commissioned officer alone escaped uninjured. ■ The machine was about to alight. Ke ports state the course was altered to avoid a small boat and tne machines tilting wing touched the water. A mo o boat rushed to the scene and rescued the survivors before the machine sank with the other occupants trapped in the iuselage. • The flying-boat, which was oi metal construction, was one of the iai oest and fastest, of its type and was equipped .with three engines. _ • Aeronautic' experts emphasise the well-known danger of misjudging the distance from 1 smooth water. Such misaccounted for the death of the Schneider' Cup flier Flight-Lieutenant Kinkead in 1929. Diving, from a speed attempt he failed to flatten out. A comparatively siiiall change of angle in the descent would have turned today’s disaster into merely a bad landin". The flying-boat came down to water-level at a speed exceeding the usual landing speed of fifty-two miles an hour. Normally it would have settled down on the surface as it lost flyin" speed; instead ‘it drove into the water at 60 mills’ an hour and an angle of twenty degrees, behind which was a weight'of' 13 foris. The force of the collision may well be imagined. Wjng- Commander. Tucker was rendered unconscious by. the impact and was carried down. Officer-Ely in the fiist pilot’s seat escaped; while Officer Ryley :in , the .forward gun cockpit and Officer Barry, in , the. aft cockpit rose to the surface. The remainder, not wamed of the danger,, found exit impossible. Divers discovered Rutledge’s body.. The flying-boat was broken in halves as it was 'salvaged. The fore part was brought up but there wei;e no bodies iu it. The remainder lies in deep, water. The wings dropped off following attempts to raise the hull. The worst previous accident was at Baghdad in 1926 when seven , were killed °in a troop-carrier crash. Ely was in. the first pilot’s, seat but Commander Tucker, who . was under instructions in the second seat, had taken over to land, tlie' flying-boat..