A CRASH AT NIGHT

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 30, 30 October 1918, Page 8

A CRASH AT NIGHT

HOW AN AIRMAN lANDED

(By Lieutenant A. H. Clegg.)

My first crash in an aeroplane increased rhther than diminished my belief in the 6afety of flying. I was attached to an K.A.F. squadron in England, which provided a thorough practical training for pilots and observers in all phases of night-Hying. One night I was detailed to accompany a pilot on a sixty miles' reconnaissance. We wero to find our way to, a certain aerodrome thirty miles away, fire a white-Verey light over it, and return. It was midnight when we started, and the waning liiocin was well .up ill the heavens. After gaining sufficient height we turned west, lii about forty minutes we were over our objective. .1 a white light as a. friendly signal to those Kelow, and we turned east for home, with the nose of the machino well down. After covering about six miles X noted with anxiety long whitish flames issuing from the "exhaust pipes. My pilot pointed meaningly to the thermometer -as lie' opened the louvres and throttled down the engine in order to get the temperature down. We lost height, but the temperature remained the same. Finally, as tho "rev." counter began to show less and less revolutions, we decided to land. A large openipiece of ground below seemed just this right place. We began to descind. When about two hundred feet from the ground a row of trees backed by an old farmhouse loomed up in fiont of us. With great, presence of mind my ■pilot pulled the .machine round just in time tor the'right wing-tips to clear the trees. By now the engine had completely stopped, and we were compelled to land, although a tall hawthorn hedge, about eighty yards in front of lis, threatened disaster. As -the wheels touched the ploughed ground at about seventy miles per hour my, Ptilot again tried to swing the machine round to the left to prevent a collision'with the hedge, i The left wheel buried itself completely while the machine swung completely round ttith startling suddenness, dipped its nose into the earth, t-nd turned a complete somersault. The sudden impact threw me clear from my nacelle in front, almost without my realising it, and while 1 1 lay on the ground -1 heard with terrifying distinctness "Cr-r-r-r-r----l'ump!" as the machino turned over and settled on its back. I sorted myself out from the tail pieces, minus one flying boot, which was still in the nacelle, and walked round the wreckage in search of my pilot. To my great surprise and relief he coolly crept from his inverted "office" absolutely unhurt. We made for the farmhouse nearby, and when at last we succeeded in finding, an entrance, a startled voice from an upper window inquired who we were. Apparently the farmer and his wife had heard the crash, and imagined that ■it was the 6onnd of a bursting bomb from a Zeppelin. UpotK learning the true state of affairs, they made us very welcome, and in a very short time we were sipping hot cocoa before a roaring fire. Not for many a long day shall I forget the gratitude and thankfulness in the. old lady's voice as she 'patted ns kindly on the back and said, "Thank God you aro both safe."