New Zealand Airmen’s Wonderful Feat

Camp News, Volume 1, Issue 4, 5 January 1940, Page 6

New Zealand Airmen’s Wonderful Feat

Two New Zealanders figured in one of the strangest flying feats of the war. A “short, slim schoolmaster” from Gisborne, and a “tall wool buyer” from Masterton brought an aeroplane back safely with only the framework of one wing left, and half the other wing gone. The damage to the wings might have been caused by lightning or by anti-aircraft fire. It is not yet certain which, but with the aircraft in this condition, the pilots kept on flying and were able to bring the machine home safe, if not sound. “A blinding yellow flash followed by a big bang,” was how No. 1 pilot described the happening that nearly wrecked them. This occurred when they were flying at about 2000 feet, and they thought for the moment that they were being threatened by enemy fighters. Presently the aircraft began to go round and round in uncontrollable circles and to drop at an alarming rate. Believing that they were about to fall into the sea, the second pilot, who was also the navigator, went aft to get the dinghy ready. He made his way back into the cabin and was dismayed to discover that practically all that was left of the top of the port wing was framework. Taking a look on the other side, he discovered that half the fabric was stripped off the starboard wing. That the aircraft was able to fly in such a condition was no less remarkable than the skill with which it was handled. To keep his pilot going, the navigator fed him with sandwiches and hot coffee. The effort of bringing the aircraft home was such that when they landed the pilot’s right arm was temporarily paralysed. “The instinct of self-preservation pulled us through,” he said afterwards, when he had partly slept off his exhaustion. “Anyhow, what a nitwit I should have been to let her fall into the sea after pulling her out of that fall.” It gives some idea of the intensity of the cold on. these flights, which on occasion reaches almost Arctic severity, to realise that a 19-year-old wireless navigator, when opening his vacuum flask to have a drink of hot tea, spilled some of it on the key of his wireless transmitter and that the | hot liquid froze. • > (Courtesy “Evening Post.”)