CAPTAIN LIGHTS THEORY

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 250, 12 January 1928, Page 9

CAPTAIN LIGHTS THEORY

DOWN IN ROUGH COUNTRY ALL PETROL RUN OUT Bp Cable. —Press Association. — Copyright. SYDNEY, Wednesday. Captain Ivan Right, one of the promoters of the Tasman flight, in conjunction with Lieut. . Walley, after carefully comparing and working out prearranged plans of the flight with the times and places where the plane was reported to be observed in New Zealand, concludes that the petrol ran out and the plane landed in rough

country around the Tararua or Rimutaka Ranges. The fliers, having been 41 hours without sleep, for 21 of which the> have been flying, would be absolutely worn out. He says they would go straight off to sleep, possibly for 24 hours. This, he says, may account for the absence of any further information as to their whereabouts. The plans of the airmen were to land on Foxton beach in case of a night landing. Captain Right states that, allowing for the influence of a known anticyclonic disturbance which it was expected might influence the flight and a possible consequent drift, he calculates the distance flown between Richmond and New Zealand at 1,630 miles, and- when it was sighted at Stephen Island the machine had been 21 hours 40 minutes in the air. He says apparently the airme. found themselves over the sea and turned toward the land seeking a landing. This would accent for their subsequent reported movements. KAI WARRA’S REPORT Captain Right accounts for the steamer Raiwarra’s report that it had seen a dropping flare by the fliers, having climbed to escape the mist, then opening the engine to descend, giving the impression of flares. Then cruising round in search for Trentham, the airmen found themselves again over the sea and turned northward toward the Rimutakas. The petrol, then running very low, wou’d give out in the rough country between the Tararua and the Rimutaka Ranges.—A. and N.Z.