OFFICIAL WIRELESS

Hokitika Guardian, 11 June 1928, Page 1

OFFICIAL WIRELESS

[Special to Press Assn, by Radio.] POLAR FLIGHT. SIR G. WILKINS HONOURED. RUGBY, June 7. A luncheon was given to-day by the British Government in honour of Sir George Wilkins, the Australian aviator, and 51 r Carl Eielson, who recently (lew together across the North Pole and tho Arctic Ocean from Alaska to Spitsbergen.

Sir Samuel Home, Secretary for Air, who presided, congratulated Sir George Wilkins on having been honoured by the King with a knighthood. He referred to the fact that both Sir George Wilkins and MrEielson had made three Arctic living expeditions that would always hold a place in the record of exploration and discovery, and declared that their latest joint flight was the most conspicuous and successful of all. They had set themselves the task of crossing the polar sea from Alaska to Spitsbergen by a new route. For threequarters of their journey they were (lying over a part of the world that had never been seen by any man. The weather and visibility were bad, and at one time the temperature was 50 degrees below zero. At another time the worst storm that Spitsbergen bad ever endured at this season of the year broke upon them. Yet they continuously carried out their observations and in a space of twenty flying hours successfully completed their splendid adventure. They bad accomplished not only a feat of bravery, but also a work of definite usefulness.

The distance between England and Japan was about 6500 miles by the route over the North Pole, as compared with over 11,000 by the ordinary flying routes of to-day. Who should say that with the development of the airship and the aeroplane the polar regions might not in future become a regular and accepted route of swift travel between west and east? What better testimony could bo afforded that man was subduing, by machinery, the brute forces of Nature? We bad only to compare the story of former polar expeditions with that of this expedition. Ice-bound ships, troops of Eskimos, fines of dogs, long trails, months and often years of absence, were a great contrast with the dash of these two men in a tiny machine for twenty hours through the air. Sir Samuel Home made sympathetic reference to the airship “ Italia,” and expressed the earnest hope that her crew might survive what appeared to have been a disaster.

INDIAN NAVY. ADMIRAL APPOINTED. RUGBY, June 7. The appointment of Rear-Admiral Humphrey Walwyn to be a flag-officer, commanding and directing the Royal Indian Marine, is the first appointment of the kind since the decision to re. construct the Royal Indian Marine as a combatant force to enable India t. enter upon the first stage of her naval development with a view ultimately to undertaking her own naval defence. The new organisation provides for the command of the force being vested in a flag officer .appointed from the Royal Navy for a period of three years. Eventually, it is hoped, the commanding appointment will he held by an officer of the Royal Indian Navy, as the new force, subject to his Majesty’s approval, is to he called. A novel feature in connection with the personnel is that Indians are to bo eligible for commissions. In its first stage of development the fleet will include four sloops, two patrol vessels, four trawlers, two surveying vessels and a depot ship. Rear-Admiral Walwyn is known both ns a talented officer and a capable organiser, aiid has a special reputation as a gunnery expert.