AIR TRAGEDY

Wairarapa Daily Times, 18 February 1935, Page 5

AIR TRAGEDY

FLYING BOAT SMASH OCCUPANTS BURNT TO DEATH. Press Association Electric Telegraph—Copyrighl MESSINA, Saturday. One of the four “Singapore” fourengined flying boats, K 3595, leisurely flying to Singapore to re-equip the air base there, crashed into a hillside in Sicily in a fog yesterday, and caught* fire. All on board were burnt to death. Misfortune had followed the machine from the start. The machine struck the hillside of Mandrazzi, a spur of the Pcloritana Range, 4000 feet high, near the village of San Filippo, at 11.15 in the morning. Apparently the pilot lost his bearings in the clouds during a storm. The wreck caught fire, and all the occupants —two officers, six men and one technician —were burnt to death. They include Flight Lieutenant Beatty, a half-brother of Lord Beatty.

•.A local carter discovered the burnt wreckage and salved a piece of the machine, which he showed to the San Filippo police as evidence of the tragedy. A Red Cross party, police, firemen and civilians, hastened to the scone. Continuous rain and the absence of roads' impeded the rescuers, who, after a mountain journey of three hours, extricated four charred corpses, including those of both the officers. The rest of those on board are believed to have been trapped in the metal hull. Firemen continued to search by torchlight until rain forced them to give up until morning. A later message states that the bodies of all the victims have been recovered, and are laid side by side, in a cave in order to protect them from the rain before they are placed in coffins, which were hastily made at Messina, and are being carried uphill to the scene by police. A few documents were recovered, including a photograph with the head burnt off and a signature at the bottom.

The coffins will he taken to"day to the Cillave Church, where a. mortuary chapel is being prepared, and to which peasant women are already bringing candles. The carter who gave the alarm was working on the mountainside when he heard a roar and saw the aeroplane burst suddenly from the clouds round the mountain top on a perilous slant—one wing down and the other aloft. The lower wing swept into the hillside, and a jet of smoke burst out, followed by a terrific explosion. The machine was aflame before it struck the mountain, upon which it broke into pieces and hurtled down the declivity. It was unapproachable owing to the heat. “I saw two men in the half-burned front of the machine, their medal ribbons being vividly visible on their chests,” he said.

The K 3592 accompanied the wrecked craft from Naples, where the squadron had been delayed since 26th Januaryby influenza and the need of awaiting spare parts from England, caused by a defective engine of the K 3595. She and the K 3592 left early in the morning, leaving the others, which are still at Naples, to follow later. The K 3592 reached Malta at 10.50, and reported having last seen her companion near Messina at 9 o’clock, but missing her over Sicily. She turned back, but failed to And her. She reports by wireless that shortage of petrol compelled her to resume her flight to Malta. The Italian authorities intercepted this message, which first suggested the disaster.