CRASH IN MID-AIR

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18479, 5 September 1925, Page 13

CRASH IN MID-AIR

SHENANDOAH BROKEN BY STORM. AIRSHIP FALLS IN SECTIONS SURVIVORS CLING TO FLYING WRECKAGE. (bt cable—pssts association—copyright.) (rioter's telegrams.) NEW YORK, September 3. Thirteen officers and men were killed when tho Navy dirigible Shenandoah crashed in a windstorm 10 miles north of Belle Yalley, Ohio, early on Thursday. One portion dropped to the ground. The other drifted 12 miles before descending. There were 42 aboard. An eye-witness says early in the morning he saw the airship nose i*p spinning on her tail. On two occasions she steadied down on her keel. Then the latter gave way and the huge craft was absolutely unmanageable. The control cabin next shot off, dropping like a plummet. The big bag then 6agged in the middle and a minute later the airship burst, though without flame or explosion. The forward half plunged to the earth and the a-ear drifted for miles, sagging all the time down toward the earth. Men Thrown Into Space. During the earlier gyrations the figures of men and furniture could be seen falling into space. After the keel snapped the Shenandoah floundered, and became uncontrollable in the storm. Without warning the giant hag emptied with a rending sound. As it burst the front half, with the keel, dropped on to a farm, and the second half floated for miles, with eight passengers, who landed uninjured. Control Car Breaks Loose. 'Men were thrown from the drifting Shenandoah like shots from a gun when the ship began in the storm. The control car was the first to break loose, and its loss left the ship without a pilot, and at the mercy of th.e wind. The bag drifted for eight miles out of control before bursting. The missing men are believed to have been scattered from the ship. A search is being made over the ground for the bodies. The Shenandoah's controller's cabin was crushed when it struck the ground and ev«ry man. in it . was instantly killed. : It was here that thirteen bodies were found, eight hundred yards from the point where the main section grounded. Most of the men in the main section were unhurt. Machine-gun armament had been placed aboard the Shenatidoaii only a few weeks ago. The largest section, of. the Shenandoah, -450 feet in length, fell in a field a mile from Ava. The control' compartment, in whicK the commander and navigators were riding, was fifty feet away. The third section, 150 feet long drifted through the air a runaway balloon for twelve miles with eight men aiboard, and all escaped injury. TOSSED BY CYCLONE. FORWARD PART CARRIES AWAY. SHIP STRAINED BY AIR CURRENTS. (Sydney "Sot" Slavics.) NEW YORK, September 3. A terrific windstorm struck tho Shenandoah, and the blasts ripped her seams, causing her to break in two sections. One half was carried 12 miles by the cyclone. The dead include: Commander Lansdowne, Lieut.-Commander Hancock, Lieutenant Lawrence, senior watchofficer, and Lieut. Houghton, watchofficer. The Shenandoah left the air station at Lakehurst, New Jerßey, on Wednesday afternoon en route to. St. Louis, which she expected to reach late tonight. On the return a 'big party of prominent men, including Mr Henry Ford, was to be given a demonstration tour around Chicago. Twenty-three of the crew reported themselves uninjured. All the killed or injured were in the forward half, which was travelling rapidly in the gale, twisting ■ and turning over, and generally acting crazily, spilling several unable to cling to the wreckage. Lient. Henley, the senior surviving officer, said that the ship practically broke into three parts. The storm gave her such a buffeting that her engine gear was dislocated from the propellers. The control department then fell free, with the stern dangling-by the cables. The storm completed the utter collapse. "All five engines," he said, "went bad when the gale struck us hard, and the ship twisted and turned crazily.'' Last Badio Message. The last, official report sent by the radio-operator aboard the airship was: '•Aja losing my seat." He previously Released: "She is rocking, heaving, ar d straining in the wind." In addition to 'the 13 dead, two of the Shenandoah's crew were injured and four are not yet accounted for. The Shenandoah,, which was built in 1922, cost 2,000,000 dollars. She left Lakehurst yesterday on a second attempt to invade the Mississippi Valley. Earlier 1,1 the summer the vessel had been tumed by threatened storms. Early tliia morning, as she was proceeding over Ohio, the ship encountered a fierce- and Jain atorm. Survivors declare that treacherous air currents wer ® responsible for the wreck. They turned the ship's nose downward, and the effort of the crew to restore her to an ® v ®a keel produced too great a «ader which the keel |