LOST IN RANGES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24424, 9 October 1940, Page 8

LOST IN RANGES

MISSING OXFORD AIRCRAFT REPORTS FROM WANGANUI SEARCH NOT ABANDONED (From Our Parliamentary Reporter! WELLINGTON, Oct. 8. “Aircraft from New Plymouth are still searching the areas from which new reports have been received.” the Prime Minister (Mr P. Fraser) said in the House of Representatives this afternoon, when discussing the steps taken in an endeavour to locate the Airspeed Gxford, with a crew of three, which went missing early last week while on a flight from Hobsonville to Ohakea. An announcement was officially made on Saturday that the air search had been abandoned, and an urgent question by Mr W. J. Poison (Opposition, Stratford) asked whether any search had been made of the hush areas further inland. He asked the Minister of Defence to undertake an adequate search in the vicinity of the Wanganui River and its tributaries if such a search had not been made. Settlers had represented to him that several people living at various points on the inland route from the coast to the main trunk railway heard, and in two cases actually saw, an aeroplane flying inland about the time the accident occurred. If that was so. the machine must have crashed far from the spot where the search was reported to have been undertaken.

“All reports received by the police or the Air Department have been thoroughly investigated, and ground parties have been organised whenever there has been any possibility of the reports proving authentic,” replied Mr Fraser, on behalf of the Minister of Defence. “Many of the reports are conflicting, and may refer to the seconu aircraft which' accompanied the missing Oxford as far as Tongaporutu and then turned'back to Auckland." Giving details of the air search, Mr Fraser said the entire coast had been covered up to a distance of 20 miles out to sea from the Manawatu River to Albatross Point, and the inland area which had been thoroughly searched several times was bounded by Albatross Point across to Pio Pio and south through Ohura to Pipikinki, then across to Waiouru, down the Manawatu. and across to the mouth of the Turakina River. An intensive search in the vicinity of the Wanganui River and its tributaries had been made. The Mount Messenger area was also searched, and the Ruahines had been searched from Palmerston North to as far north as ’Makaretu.