RIVER OF FLAME

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 January 1939, Page 5

RIVER OF FLAME

FLIGHT OVER FIRE=SWEPT TERRITORY AIR PASSENGER’S NARRATIVE. GREAT AREA BLACKENED & RUINED. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, January 16. “Baked apples on a tree in an orchard near Melbourne gave me an idea of the effects of the bush fires,” said Captain R. E. Murray, Wellington Army Publicity Officer, who returned by the Awatea after attending a military conference in Melbourne. “Flying at 10,000 feet in a Douglas machine of Australian National Airways it was shocking to see the ruined and blackened country down below and to know that there were people there, specially children,” Captain Murray continued, in describing his impressions of the fires as viewed from the air.

“We were flying over fire country for hundreds of miles. People in New Zealand have no conception of the extent of the fires. “When I left Melbourne it was covered by haze and visibility was extremely poor. Out at Essendon aerodrome there was a terrific smell of smoke and, perhaps as a result of the exceptional conditions, the machine had difficulty in getting away.

“Our aeroplane flew right across the fires. It was impossible to see much in Victoria because of the smoke which covered the earth but over New South Wales the fire was like a river of flame through the bush. From theair the land looked baked.”

As night fell and the monoplane continued her journey to Kingsford Smith Aerodrome, Sydney, the five passengers had a better view of the leaping flames below. Captain Murray said that only the actual front over which the flames were advancing was clearly visible and this was represented by a narrow winding line of fire stretching clear across the country.

“On the way over from Sydney a friend in Melbourne telephoned me aboard the Awatea and said that the position was desperately serious,” Captain Murray said. “Even last week the heat was terrific. I had never experienced anything like it. Trying to keep cool I got on a cable-car but could stand it for only two blocks. It was cooler in the street.”