TOLL OF THE AIR.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXIII, Issue 18762, 29 December 1930, Page 11

TOLL OF THE AIR.

DOMINION’S LIST OF FATALITIES. A shocking aeroplane accident, which occurred at Mangere East on 1 Monday last, when a Moth machine from the Auckland Aero Club crashed from a height of 2500 feet, and burst into flames, was the thirteenth flying : fatality in New Zealand. The pilot, ( Cyril Olsen, aged 23, was killed instanely, his charred remains being recovered later from the burning wreckage. Dominion’s Fatal Flights. The first flying accident in the Dominion’s history occurred at Christ- i church, in 1919, the victim being Mr Cecil W. Hill, chief pilot and instructor to the Canterbury Aviation Company. He was flying a machine which had been built in the Company’s hangar at Sockbum, giving a demonstration flight, when the tragedy occurred. After performing a series of stunts, he was coming out of a loop at 4000 feet, when a wing collapsed, and the machine hurtled earthward, nose first, embedding itself near the racecoruse. In the next year, the most serious aviation accident which the Dominion has had, occurred at New Plymouth, when Captain Richard Russell, D.F.C., Croix de Guerre, a noted war pilot, Mr James Clarke, Mayor of New Plymouth, and Miss Kathleen Wamock, aged 24, were killed. Throughout the day, November 11, 1920, Captain Russell had been giving passenger flights in the machine, an Avro belonging to Walsh Brothers, from the racecourse. The machine dropped into a spin, and never recovered, pilot and passengers being killed instantly. The accident was witnessed by a large crowd attending the New Plymouth Boys’ High School sports. Lieutenant H. C. Grout, a pilot of the | Canterbury Aviation Company, crashed ■ in a field near Cheviot on December 30, 1921, while flying from Blenheim to Sockburn. He was alive when taken from the wreck, but died in hospital that night. The Dominion enjoyed immunity from flying accidents for nearly five years until on March 17, 1926, Captain F. J. Horrell and Lieutenant P. A. Turner, two officers of the Territorial Air Force, on a refresher course, and Mr L. T. Reid, a jockey, employed at the aerodrome as a waiter, crashed at Sockburn. Captain Horrell and Mr Reid, who was in the machine as a passenger, were killed. The aeroplane fell in the rose garden of the Methodist Orphanage, striking the ground twelve yards from a room in which 60 children were having their evening meal. The cause of the crash was an unsuccessful attempt to loop j the loop, a manoeuvre which Captain Horrell had accomplished several times , previously. The machine dived at a terrific speed, burying its nose deep in , the ground. The disappearance of Captain Hood ; and Lieutenant Moncrieff on their Tasman flight on January 10, 1928, was the only other tragedy which marred > New Zealand aviation until the Dornier • Libelle flying boat dived in Auckland ; harbour, off Milford beach, killing l Captain D. E. Harkness, D.S.C., the : pilot, and Mr Charles Goldsbro, the mechanic, in December of last year. Three tragedies have occurred during ' the year 1930. The first of these was 5 when Mr O. B. Cottrell’s Monocoupe , nose-dived and crashed on a mud flat . at Porirua, killing the pilot, Mr M. J. I Cameron. That happened on April x 7. On May 21 a Moth spun into the ground from 1000 feet at Te Awamutu. * Both pilot and passenger, Captain A. 1 W. Saunders, D.F.C., and Mr A. W. r Minchin, died of their injuries. Mr Olsen’s accident is the third i within the year, and makes the thirteenth death from flying accidents in 3 New Zealand.