RISKED LIVES

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 301, 15 August 1932, Page 7

RISKED LIVES

FLYERS DROP FOOD FOR STARVING MINER3. VANCOUVER, July 13. A dramatic story of the manner in which two Vancouver airmen risked life and lixnb to drop food supplies to the starving miners at the McConnell Creek placer field north of Burns Lake, recently, is told in letter received by Major D. R. MaeLaren, D.S.O., assistant general manager of Canadian Airways, Limited. The flight was made by Pilot E. P. H. Wells and Air Engineer William Faulkner, in a float-equipped Foklcer monoplane. Unable to land at the camp, where the lake was still frozen over, they flew baek and forth over the snow-covered slopes of the nearhy mountainside, fighting against bumps and down drafts. Tied to his 'Plane. Eight hundred pounds of food had been sacked in conyenient sizes for tossing overboard, and the 'plane's cabin door had been removed. A bad cross-wind made fiying hazardous, and Wells had to fly at nearly full throttle to fight against the bumps. Faulkner, lying on.his stomach with s his hand and head projeeting from the machins, was tied with a rope so that he could not slip overboard. It was a wise preeaution, too, for one air hump actually lifted Faulkner from the floor almost to the roof of the cabin. It took 20 minutes to drop the supplies, for care was required to launch the heavy sacks so that they would not strike the floats and yet land within a small radius as possible. Faulkner was nearly frozen in the process, his hands and face becoming severely, frost-bitten, but he stuck gamely to the job and each time tbe 'plane swept back over the hillside he launched another sack. Delayed by Storms. When all the supplies had been tossed over — and most of the sacks. landed close together about an hour's hiking distance from the camp — the airmen flew low over the camp to deliver messages and mail. This, too, was dangerous, as the creek runs in a deep and narrow canyon not more than 100 yards wide. Fiying only 100 feet above the camp, the pilot would not have had a chance if a foreed landing became necessary. On the flight in to the McConnell Creek area the 'plane was held up at Takio Lake, Bear Lake and Thudade Lake by storms. Altogether the flight, which ordinarily occupied only a few hours, required three days. Knowing that the men in camp were so short of supplies as to be on the verge of starvation, the airmen took as many risks as they dared in pushing through.