FRIGHTFUL SUFFERING

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 488, 18 October 1928, Page 9

FRIGHTFUL SUFFERING

PARTY LOST IN DESERT MEN'S SUICIDE PACT CAIRO, October S. A tale of frightful suffering from heat and thirst in the desert, ending in a suicide pact, has been told by the men who were on Friday rescued by aviators as they were stalking each other with rifles, in a demented state. Gashing their arms and sucking the blood was one of the things they did to allay their raging thirst. Previously they had drunk the water from the radiator of their car. Ibrahim Bey, an official of the Royal Horsehold, and Gino Cristini, and Italian, with a chauffeur and a guide, took ample water provisions and petrol for a day’s shooting, and kept the pyramids in sight while they hunted gazelle. They decided at 10.30 a.m. to return to Cairo, and discarded the remainder of the water and tood. Then they changed their minds, and went farther afield, against the guide’s warning. They lost sight of the yyramids and wandered fruitlessly in all directions. Their petrol became exhausted and night came on. When day dawned the guide realised that he was lost, and tried to make Gizeh, while the others tried different routes. The guide, after floundering for two days, met a Bedouin caravan and eventually reached Cairo. The others, meanwhile, had reassembled, and’ believed that help would soon arrive. They drank water from the radiator of the car, and endured the desert’s fierce heat for two days, when they determined to push on, hoping to sight the pyramids again. They trudged across the sand for three days, chewing herbs, till they reached “Hell Ravine’’ on Wednesday, where they took refuge in a cave to escape from the heat. By doing this they frustrated the efforts of tho Royal Air Force searchers. Feeling sure on Thursday that an agonising death was inevitable, they planned to commit suicide. One sportsman would shoot his companion, and the chaffeur would then shoot himself, but the Egyptian chauffeur did not like the plan, saying, “We must wait and pray to God to help us.’’