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Southern Crossers Flayed. Two men died this spring hunting to rescue Charles Kingsford-Smith, Charles Ulm and their crew of the Southern Cross "lost" in wild Australia. The flyers, who guided the Southern Cross across the Pacific from San Francisco to Brisbane, Australia last summer (TIME, June 18, 1928), had made a feint to fly from Sydney to London. Last week an Australian committee of inquiry found that they had considered, although not deliberately planned, "losing" themselves for purposes of publicity and money, that they "did not carry an efficient emergency radio set, did not ascertain whether emergency rations were aboard, did not consult the weather bureau regarding weather conditions, did not carry suitable tools, and did not make adjustments for changing the radio receiving set into a transmitter, which would have enabled them to communicate with the outside world." Also, inexplicably, they did not use their oil for smoke signals. Rebuked, they immediately started for London.
Endurance Attempts. The Question Mark stayed in the air 150 hrs. (TIME, Jan. 14). The Fort Worth stayed up 172½ hrs. (TIME, June 3). To surpass these records four planes were flying last week. At Cleveland R. L. Mitchell and Byron K. Newcomb took up the Stinson-Detroiter Miss Cleveland. As the new week began they were still flying. Also flying were Leo Norm's and Maurice Morrison in another Cessna at Los Angeles. At Minneapolis Thorwald Johnson and Owen Haughland kept the Cessna Miss Minneapolis up for 150 hrs., when a broken valve forced them down. At Roosevelt Field, L. I., Viola Gentry, flying cashier, and Jack Ashcraft, went up in the Cabinair biplane The Answer, after only one practice flight. They unexpectedly ran out of gas after 10 hrs., tried to land through a mist, crashed. Ashcraft was killed, Miss Gentry badly hurt. Her first and continuous cries after the smash were for "Bill." "Bill" was William Ulbrich, at whose mother's Mineola home she lived. He, at the time, was just overhead flying for the record with Pilot & Mrs. Martin Jensen in their Bellanca Three Musketeers. While Miss Gentry lay in the hospital and Pilot Ashcraft was at an undertaker's, the Three Musketeers flew on, on; stayed up 70½ hrs., when their refueling plane, disabled, could sustain them no longer.
Round Trip
From Roosevelt Field, L. I., Captain Frank Monroe Hawks of the Texas Co. flew a Lockheed-Vega to Los Angeles in 19 hrs. 10 min. 32 sec. He rested awhile and returned to Roosevelt Field in the fastest transcontinental time—17 hrs.. 38 min., 16 sec. Total flying time for the round trip: 36 hrs., 48 min., 48 sec. Said he: "I do not think a transcontinental flight need be a non-stop affair. This, too, is still impractical and must be classed as a stunt. . . . Frankly, the only reason I made non-stop flights was to draw closer attention to the feasibility of flying across the continent, with stops or without."
*Last month Mr. Keys bought Pitcairn Aviation mail-carrying unit of Harold F. Pitcairn's group. Last week Mr. Keys sold Pitcairn Aviation to North American Aviation, holding company of which he is president.
†Only that amount of its $200,000,000 stock has been sold.