LOST AIRMEN

Hokitika Guardian, 3 May 1929, Page 5

LOST AIRMEN

LAST RESTING PLACE

TO BE WAVE HILL

(Australian Press Association)

SYDNEY, May 2

The Prime Minister has announced that the Federal Government intends, to adhere to its original intention of bringing the bodies of Anderson and Hitchcock back to civilisation. An overland party is being sent from Darwin with two caskets, borne by camels, f to the scene. The bodies will be exhumed and taken to Wave Hill, who they will be given a suitale burial. Three headstones will also be erected. It is further intended to erect a memorial at the Alice Springs aerodrome, whence the gallant fellows took off on the final stage of their illfated flight. Four Air Force planes are remaining at their bases with the object of cooperating with the overland party. SEARCH COSTS £20,000. SYDNEY, Mlny 2. Referring to the Kookaburra tragedy, the Commodore in Chief of the Air Force said that a tragic aspect of the matter was that, after Anderson and Hitchock had repaired their engine, they were apparently overtaken by thirst before they could get the plane again into the air. The Government, he said, had already spent £20,000 on the search operations. WHEN LAST SEEN. A PROSPECTOR’S STORY. fßeooi ed this day at 8.30. a.m.) ADELAIDE. May 3. Martin Krommer, a gold prospector, now visiting Adelaide, tells of a romantic meeting with Anderson and Hitchcock thirty-four miles south of Oodnadatta on April 9th. Krommer was sitting on'the roadside when the Kookaburra alighted nearby. He hurried to the ’plane and saw the aviators examining the engine. Anderson asked Hitchcock for a box of tools and Hitchcock replied: “Somebody stole them while I was in hospital.” Hitchcock had a bad illness some time before the flight. Anderson retorted: “Why didn’t you ’’tell me at Broken Hill?” They worked on the engine, using a screw-driver as a chisel, and the end oif a corkscrew as a hammer. They had difficulty in getting into the air, until Krommer held one wing and Hitchcock the other. Then .both thanked Krommer, shook hands, and flmv away. ' Krommer said’ it seemed that the aviators were very short of tools, due to the theft by somebody. THE COMPASS USED. <Received this day at 10 a.m.) W SYDNEY, May 3. * In has now been disclosed that the compass with which Anderson and Hitchcock were taken so far out of their course on the ill-fated Kookaburra flight, was-fitted into the plane only the day before it left Richmond. The compass was that used by Captain Lancaster in his flight 'from England in the Red Rose with Mrs Miller, and it was not used or tested since.