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Post by TS on Jul 25, 2016 16:35:43 GMT 12
Hi all, I have four small Volume books called Beginnings. These where written in 1978 by Paul Titchener, They're all about Aucklands North Shore in the early days. Believe it or not we got them from a second hand shop in Cambridge.
But in Volume Two, there is an article about air disasters on the shore which briefly wrights about North Head and the Walsh Brothers. But it goes on to say that in December 1930 a Dornier Libelle flying boat crashed off Milford beach with no survivors. Then it mentions about two kittyhawks that collided over the airforce bombing range at St David's Rocks close to the Noisies in the Gulf.
Does anybody else know about that? is there more information on it? I've lived on the shore all my life and this is the first I had heard of it.
The book also wrights about the B17 and the B24, that has been covered here before. Plus the two Hudson Crashes, albeit very brief.
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Post by John L on Jul 25, 2016 17:46:29 GMT 12
The Dornier crashed of Milford beach, didn't it?
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Post by errolmartyn on Jul 25, 2016 19:14:19 GMT 12
The following is a draft entry for a series covering New Zealand deaths in civil aviation since 1899 that I am preparing for publication in the Aviation Historical Society's journal - The Aero Historian:
Thu 12 Dec 1929 Aerial Services Ltd, Auckland, Dornier Do.12A Libelle II ZK-ABI (ZK-ABI registration reserved but not yet worn as certificate of airworthiness was not yet issued) At about 4.30 the all-metal Cirrus III-powered Libelle was towed by boat from its mooring at Mechanics Bay into the bay for tests on the water. Probably to test a recently-installed auxiliary petrol system, some taxiing was carried out then three or four runs made across the water during which the Dornier lifted a few feet off the surface for about a half a mile. During its final run, at 5.30, the flying boat took off and headed towards Devonport and over Takapuna towards Milford Beach at relatively low level. When at about 300 feet and several hundred yards off the centre of the beach the machine stalled and spun into the sea, whereupon it turned over in the water and sank 30 feet to the seabed.
It took several hours to recover the wrecked machine and bring it to the beach shore, and to extricate the bodies of the two occupants – pilot Donald Harkness and mechanic Charles Goldsbro. It was later reported that on nearing the shore a heavy stone of about 50 lb was seen resting on Harkness’s knee. The stone the was thrown into the water but could not be found again in a subsequent search; there was some conjecture at the inquest as to whether it was placed in the cockpit by Harkness or if it had embedded itself there accidentally during wreckage recovery operations.
William Man, DFC, a very experienced ex-RNAS and RAF pilot with some 900 hours of flying experience, 800 of them on aeroplanes, and had flown the Libelle on its first New Zealand flight on 17 November (accompanied by ex-Australian Flying Corps pilot Major G. A. C. Cowper who at the time was working for Hamilton Airways) and again on the day prior to the accident. A second flight attempt on the 19th (17th?) had failed because the Cirrus was not developing sufficient power. Contemporary reports are unclear, but the flight on 11 December may have been only the second one made by the little flying boat at Auckland, the intervening period being taken up with work on the engine issue. Man also was of the opinion that the stone could have been place in the machine as ballast for the taxiing trials. He also went on to say that until the fatal flight Harkness had never been airborne in the Libelle, not even as a passenger, and on the day was not wearing any flying kit and to best of his knowledge had not intended to then take it into the air.
Aerial Services Ltd was formed in June 1929. Harkness and two of his brothers held the majority of the shares. The three other shareholders included Hubert R. Burrett, the man who used his boat to tow the Libelle out into Mechanics Bay for the fatal flight, and George E. Watt, who during the Second World War was to become deeply involved in British development of the jet engine. The company failed to survive the disaster and was dissolved not long afterwards.
Aerial Services had imported two of the little three-seater Libelle flying boats, the first all-metal aircraft to be imported into the country, but had assembled just the one. The unassembled machine, along with some salvaged parts from the crashed machine, was later sold to Fiji where it had a short flying life as VQ-FAB until damaged in a storm in March 1931. Much later it found its way back to Germany and was restored by the Dornier company in the late 1970s. It is now on display in the Deutsches Museum in Munich as the world’s sole surviving example of the 14 Libelle that were built.
† Captain Donald Ernest (‘Don’) HARKNESS, DSC, RNAS, RAF, NZAF, aged 34 (Purewa Cemetery, Auckland) At the time of the accident Harkness held a Pilot’s ‘A’ Licence (No 42) that had been issued to him on 10 August 1929. He would have needed a ‘B’ Licence for commercial flying but this was not a requirement at the time for test flying.
Donald Harkness was interned in Holland in September 1916 on being forced to land there when his RNAS Sopwith 1½ Strutter was hit by anti-aircraft fire during a bombing raid. In April 1918 he was, unusually, granted six months leave on parole to visit New Zealand. With the war nearing its end by the time he reached England on the return journey he was able to avoid going back to his Dutch hosts. While in England awaiting release from the RAF, he had a lucky escape when another ex-RNAS New Zealander, Lieutenant James W. P. Amos, took him for a passenger flight in an Avro 504 on 7 January 1919. Amos took off in a climbing turn to the right downwind, stalled and crashed. Amos was hospitalised for several months recovering from the injuries he sustained, but Harkness was only slightly injured. In January 1926 he was appointed to a commission as a captain in the territorial New Zealand Air Force (NZAF) and was still a serving member at the time of his death. In 2014 the Harkness family published an impressive 562-page biography about their airman ancestor; A World War 1 Adventure – The life and times of RNAS bomber pilot Donald E. Harkness includes extracts from his many letters and also a chapter about the fatal flight. The book is undoubtedly the most comprehensive account published to date about a New Zealand airman of the Great War.
† Charles Field GOLDSBRO, aged 39 (Purewa Cemetery, Auckland) Goldsbro, a motor engineer by trade, had served with the NZEF in the New Zealand Engineers in New Zealand and England during the war until discharged as medically unfit in the latter country in April 1918. He had been engaged by Aerial Services Ltd as its engineer just the week before the accident, presumably to help find a solution to the Libelle’s engine problem and for which purpose he was undoubtedly flying with Harkness when killed. He was also a keen motor-boat enthusiast and a fortnight earlier had raced his power-boat Blimp at a regatta on the Whau Creek. Interested in aviation ‘for some time’, Goldsbro was said to be training, or about to begin training, for his pilot’s licence.
Errol
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 25, 2016 21:13:47 GMT 12
I don't recall hearing about the P-40 collision before. I'd like to know more, Does it say the pilots were killed or injured?
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Post by TS on Jul 25, 2016 22:02:22 GMT 12
I don't recall hearing about the P-40 collision before. I'd like to know more, Does it say the pilots were killed or injured? Just checked on that. No survivors in the Kittyhawk collision and it happened in 1943. Two years after a fatal military tiger moth crash off Narrow Neck Beach in March 1941 killing both the pilot and co-pilot. It also says that details of these crashes and others had still not been made public some 35 years later. Bearing in mind that these volumes where printed in 1978. Another interesting fact is that if WW11 had gone on for much longer the Americans had plans to reclaim Ngataringa Bay for a Military aerodrome adjacent to the Naval Base.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 25, 2016 22:17:40 GMT 12
The crash off Narrow Neck was NZ722 of the Flying Instructor's School, Hobsonville, which crashed into sea 600 yards off Narrow Neck Beach, Auckland, about 1000 hours on 31 August 1940. Pilot Officer Robert Goldstone was killed and Pilot Officer B. Le Pine was injured, but rescued by Navy vessel.
My late friend Trevor Pearce was in an anti-aircraft crew on the shore at the time and they were training their gun on the aircraft as it did aerobatics over the water. They were using wooden shells so were surprised when the officer yelled fire that the plane spun into the sea.
I cannot work out which P-40's supposedly collided over Milford however.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 25, 2016 22:29:13 GMT 12
"Another interesting fact is that if WW11 had gone on for much longer the Americans had plans to reclaim Ngataringa Bay for a Military aerodrome adjacent to the Naval Base."
This seems a bit strange. The New Zealand Government built Ardmore for the US Navy but in the end they did not need nor want it, which is why the RNZAF moved in there in 1943. Had the need arisen for the US Navy to need an airfield they had the options of Ardmore, Seagrove, Whenuapai, Hobsonville and Mangere to operate from as already established and active airfields, plus there was a landing field at Kumeu. I'm not sure why they'd consider all the expense, labour and trouble of filling in what is a pretty large bay, especially when they planned the construction of a different Naval port down near Clevedon when Ardmore was built to support it. I didn't think they had any interest in the RNZN base at Devonport.
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Post by planewriting on Jul 25, 2016 23:17:05 GMT 12
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Post by Bruce on Jul 25, 2016 23:34:02 GMT 12
I just had a look through the ADF serials listing for RNZAF P40s to try and identify those in the collision over the Noises. I was very surprised how many mid - air collisions involving P40s there were! I guess lots of planes out and about during wartime. Oddly the only possible match is NZ3034 and NZ3037 on 6th August 1943, however the listing refers to the location as "Weeks Island". Some Google searching shows Weeks Island is the old name for Puketutu Island in the Manukau harbour (where the sewage ponds used to be). 3014 and 3018 had a collision over Seagrove, and several single aircraft crashed in the Hauraki gulf in separate incidents, but I cant seem to find any possible matches. One or other source may be in error.
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Post by Bruce on Jul 25, 2016 23:34:46 GMT 12
snap! posted while typing my response!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 25, 2016 23:56:50 GMT 12
I did the same thing as you two, and I researched Weeks Island too and discounted it as it is nowhere near Milford.
I wonder if this is another local myth that has gone into the book? Perhaps that is why the details had not been released after all those years, because it never happened?
If the pilots died, Errol would have known about it.
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Post by TS on Jul 26, 2016 8:40:18 GMT 12
Yep it could very well be a local myth going by what you chaps have researched.
But over last weekend I spoke to my Uncle who lives on the cliff at Murrays Bay. His late father in-law whom also lived in that area, recalled watching two aircraft in the distance over the Noises, then seeing a large splash he thought that they had been shooting at mines for practice in the sea. As the whole harbour entrance was mined right across from Tiri Island round the Noises and up to the mainland. The only way ships could enter and leave the port was via the Tiri Channel.
But it could have been anything we may never know.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 26, 2016 9:06:23 GMT 12
I very much doubt that they were shooting at tethered defence sea mines. Those mines were all interconnected through an intricate electronic system that allowed them to be triggered simultaneously so they all went up together should the enemy be caught making a dash into the harbour. Shooting at any one of them would surely have upset that system. It remained in place till mid-late 1945, as I have interviewed the Naval officer given the task of dismantling the system. He was from Cambridge before WWII.
They may have been shooting at a towed target on the sea's surface, air to sea gunnery practice. Or perhaps the splash was unrelated, a breaching whale maybe?
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Post by TS on Jul 26, 2016 10:49:26 GMT 12
Could have been a towed target who knows. But not a breathing whale as the Noises are to far out to see that from land.
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Post by Peter Lewis on Jul 26, 2016 22:21:50 GMT 12
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