SHIP DISASTER.

Manawatu Herald, Volume LI, Issue 4532, 18 November 1930, Page 1

SHIP DISASTER.

Kill I 1 CRASHES

Paris, No;V. IG.

The French naval airship VIO, which set out last night to seek for the Do.X., which had not answered the wireless signals, crashed near its base at Rochefort early this morning.

Following a heavy escape of gas ;m explosion occurred, blit the crew of eight were saved by the pilot’s presence of mind in shutting off the engines and throwing over as much ballast as possible in order to delay Mile fall. The ship- hit the ground with such force as to become a tangled mass of metal and fabric. EXPERIENCES OF R-10U. A graphic 'account of the storm met by the airship RIOO during its recent (light to Canada, and the way in which it “rolled like a tramp steamer in a rough sea,” is given in a letter from one of the airship’s officers, received by an Auckland resident. No trouble was encountered until within 150 miles of Montreal, the letter .says. When passing the month of a river flowing into the St. Lawrence, the ship received a teirritie gust broadside on, and the officer commented that, it was the only occasion hie bad known an airship to roll. He said that such was the force exerted on the ship that a portion of the covering was torn. About 30 square feet on the port stabilising fin was found to be in ribbons when an inspection was made, but a spare sheet of fabric was spread over the hole, and it remained in position. 'The repair bad only just been completed and the airship was running quietly above the St. Laurence toward Montreal, when it encountered a thunderstorm, the letter continues. The airship was flying at about 1200 ft. at the time, and a strong upward current of air created by the storm lifted the ship quite gently at first on a fairly even keel to 300 ft. The current then got under the tail fins and tilted the nose down at an angle of about 25 degrees. The airship went on rising with the nose down, to 4000 ft.

“The pa stingers had just sat down to dinner when this occurred, and it can he imagined what a clatter and rattle there was as crockery, glass, soup and everything shot off the taibles across the saloon,” the letter continues.

The officers said that a tin of “dope,”, which is the preparation with which aircraft fabric is treated, was unfortunately upset just above the control car, and the contents spilled through the flooring into the wireless cabin. As “dope” is very inflammable, the electric light had to be cut off in the wireless cabin so that the occupants of the cabin were in darkness while the ship was still at a steep angle. After the ship had righted itself, sjome five minutes later, it was found that the ’plane that had been repaired temporarily had weathered the storm without any damage, but the other one had two slits in it, each 20ft. long. It took another four hours to get t his sewn up and patched, .and by this time the ship was over Montreal, which was a wonderful sight at night with its myraid of lights. The home trip was uneventful.