CLUES TO HINKLER RECEIVED

Taranaki Daily News, 20 January 1933, Page 7

CLUES TO HINKLER RECEIVED

CONDITIONS HINDER SEARCH CHANCE OF FINDING HIM REMOTE By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright. London, Jan. 18. Captain W. L. Hope received two clues during the search for Mr. Hinkler. Two students ski-ing near the Diablerets, on Saturday say that they sighted a machine, probably Mr. Hinkler’s, while a gendarme at Montana also saw a machine the identification marks of which correspond with those of Mr. Hinkler’s plane. . . . . ■ . A continuance of snowy conditions m the Alps is not only hindering Captain Hope’s search but has rendered more remote his chance of sighting the aeroplane from the air. As a consequence the London search committee has accepted the offer of two expert mountaineers to go to the Alps and carefully search the area round Montana and Vermala and other slopes about which the aeroplane was seen. The committee has accepted Mrs. J. A. Molli son’s offer to aid in the search and she leaves at the first opportunity.

Captain Hope, accompanied by M. Kammacher, director of the Lausanne airport, flew for two and a-half hours over side valleys of the Rhone. Fog and clouds reduced their visibility and they had to return when snow began.to .fall.. Mittelholzer, a leading Swiss airman, states that the day Hinkler began his flight the weather was bad over the mountains in the Valais Canton and he would have had to ascend to 15,720 feet in order to fly above the clouds. This was impossible owing to the heavy load of petrol. He is of the opinion that Hinkler, owing to the fog and clouds, lost his way owing to insufficient knowledge of the geography of the region and may have crashed into a mountain-side. “It is 1000 to one against a single aeroplane finding any trace of Hinkler or his machine,” said the airman.