CRASH ON ALPS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 November 1943, Page 2

CRASH ON ALPS

MEMBERS OF PARTY SAFE

NIGHT SPENT ON MOUNTAIN SIDE.

ACCIDENT CAUSED BY SUDDEN DOWN DRAUGHT.

(By Telegraph—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, October 31

The occupants of the Air Travel aeroplane which crashed on a plateau of ice at 9.40 a.m. on Friday while on a short flight over the Franz Josef Glacier were uninjured. The cause of the accident was a sudden down draught. The pilot and four women passengers spent the night on a mountain side 5000 feet above sea level and returned to the Franz Josef hostel in Waiho Gorge at 1.50 p.m. on Saturday, having spent 28 hours in the open, and, apart from lack of sleep, suffered no ill-effects. A slight abrasion on the nose of Pilot Gpenshaw was the only injury of any sort to any of the party. The passengers in the plane were Miss Clare McQuitty (Dunedin), Miss Molly Wilson (Morrinsville), Miss Margaret Cornwall (Cambridge), and Mrs M. J. Ward (Whangarei). The women paid tribute to the pilot’s efforts in taking them off the icefield to the rocky mountain side 400 yards away, negotiating crevasses up to 50 feet. deep. All the occupants of the plane were in ordinary clothing and had no aids in negotiating the icefield. The first rescue party was two hours late in reaching them at 9 p.m. on Friday, and it was decided not to push on to the Defiance hut overnight as planned. After taking hot milk and provisions brought by the rescue party, they huddled together on the open mountainside, and spent most of the night singing and talking. At 4.45 a.m. on Saturday the nine members of the party set out for the hostel, being joined on the way by a second search party. The journey took exactly 9 hours.