DUCHESS’S FEAT.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18652, 22 August 1930, Page 12

DUCHESS’S FEAT.

LONDON-CAPETOWN FLIGHT Described by the Director of Civil Aviation in Great Britain (Sir Sefton Brancker) as “the best thing in civil aviation for three or four years,” the London to Capetown and return flight by the Duchess of Bedford in April of this year brought to a close another noteworthy chapter in the long association with flying o a distinguished member of the English peerage. Mr Robert Little, navigator and assistant pilot on the “Spider” told the story of the flight. “Adventures on the flight started at the most inconsiderate of times—for instance, when we were flying over hundreds of miles of forests in Tanganyika in which it would have been impossible to land, to our horror we saw that the oil gauge showed that we had only four gallons left, and a few minutes later it was two gallons. We had two or three more hours’ flying before we could hope to land. We thought that the only thing to do was to make a forced landing in the forest, though we knew our chance of being found or heard of again was remote. Soon after this the oil disappeared from the oil gauge altogether, and we assumed that the end was at hand and flew on waiting for the machine to stop. To our amazement, however, it did not and when we ultimately landed we found that the oil gauge had merely broken while the tank was full of oil. “In Rhodesia we had another exciting experience, we had run into very bad weather while flying above dense forests. We were flying under a curtain of low cloud just above the trees and surrounded by hills, and were circling around looking for a way out, because it was impossible to fly info the cloud without the danger of hitting the mountains around us, and eventually we had to go miles off our course in our effort to find a gap througth the clouds. Presently we decided to steer south in the hopes of seeing the Zambesi, which would give us our position, but to our dismay we could not find it, and this was very serious as there was nothing but masses of trees and jungle in which we could not land. After hours of flying with petrol getting short, we came to the conclusion that we had lost our way and we should merely have to fly on with the jungle underneath until we crashed. Captain Barnard and I mutually agreed that it was all up, but we did not say anything to the Duchess, who through her field glasses was busy studying the wild game which were close, as we were flying so low. When we bad less than one hour’s petrol suppty, to our immense joy, we saw some mine buildings, and a few minutes later a railway line, which we were immediately able to identify as the Livingstone and Bulawayo railway line. This meant of course, that as soon as we could find somewhere to land we were saved from being utterly lost in the jungle. What we had been afraid of was that we were west of Livingstone, in which case there would only have been thousands of miles of desert, in which we should have had no hope whatever. “Near Bulawayo we had another adventure. Captain Barnard was flying the machine at the time and became so over-poweringly sleepy that he sent a note to me to take over from him. The Duchess also fell heavily asleep,,, and when I had taken over for abouf ten minutes I could hardly keep my eyes open. We could not make it out, and we thought that it must be the great fatigue of the journey. Things became so difficult that we could only fly by taking turns of about 20 minutes. On landing we found that this was due to an exhaust pipe inside the fuselage which had broken and was filling the place with carbon monoxide gas, a deadly poison, which has no smell and has the effect of putting one to sleep. There is no doubt that we . had a very lucky escape on this occasion; on top of all this we found that I the flame from the broken exhaust pipe 1 was playing directly on the carburettor and might easily have set the macj hine on Are. | “I need not tell you much about the • forced landing we had in Bulgaria, as it has been fully reported in the Press. Captain Barnard was flying the machine at the time, and no one but a most exceptionally gifted pilot could have achieved a forced landing under those conditions. The machine was very heavy, having just started with a full load of petrol, and in such conditions the machine is practically uncontrollable when the engine is not running, yet he succeeded in landing the machine against the Wind in a very small space surrounded by hills.

“Although it was not an adventure, a plague of flies we came across in Khartoum was most interesting. One night we were being entertained at the Grand Hotel when a plague of tiny green flies came on which were so dense that the three lights over the billiard table were entirely obscured by the solid mass of flies, so that we had to turn the lights out to be able to see to play. Throughout the flight we satisfied ourselves with practically only one meal a day, which was dinner, after we landed for the night. We started so early every morning that we had to be content with a cup of tea.” The Duchess of Bedford, who is 64 years old, has been an enthusiastic flyer since 1926 and has a flying record of

over 50,000 miles to her credit. It will be remembered that with Captain Barnard she flew by easy stages to India and back last year and has since made two extended air tours in Europe. Besides being such an experienced aviator, the Duchess is an expert on ornithology and zoology, while much of her spare time in summer is taken up by fishing, and many nursing institutes have reason to be grateful to the kind interest she takes in their work. She is the daughter of Archdeacon Tribe, of Simla, and married the Duke of Bedford in 1888. and her prowess as a cricketer is well remembered in Simla, particularly a game when she scored 50 in a matqh for ladies in 1886.