Northwest History. Alaska. Aviation Crashes & Wreckage Missing Planes.

• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1933
• Subjects: sea; Nome; Alaska; Bering sea; Jimmie Mattern; Texan round-the-world flyer; Khabarovsk; storms; western coast; aviation; wilderness; cloud banks; fog; Northwest; Pacific > History > 20th century; Bering Sea; Pacific; Siberia
• Online Access: http://content.libraries.wsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/clipping/id/89972

Silence Of Sea Gives No Clew To Lost Flyer. SILENCE OF SEA GIVES NO CLEW 10 LOSI FLYER NOME, Alaska, June 16. (/P)—Silence blanketed the Bering sea and Alaska today over the fate of Jimmie Mattern, Texan round-the-world flyer, unreported since leaving the Siberian coast two days ago. On the ninth and most difficult leg of his solo world flight, Mattern's gas supply, had he remained in the air, would have been used up by 11:30 p. m. (E. S. T.) last night, and he would have been compelled to land. Along the 2500-mile hop from Khabarovsk, Siberia, no ship nor land settlement had reported sighting him. While searching plans were held in abeyance today because of the frequency with which "lost planes" have turned up in Alaska, aviation men recalled that he had said before leaving Khabarovsk several days ago on his first attempt to reach Alaska that his plane was in "fine shape." No severe storms, either, had faced him on the trail. Fog banks and overcast skies lay over the Bering sea and the western coast of Alaska in the early hours yesterday, at the completion of the 16 to 17 hours he was given to make the 2500-mile flight. Had he pushed through to interior Alaska, he should have found safe landing places, aviation men said. A landing at an isolated settlement or in the wilderness, flyers here said, might not be reported for days. The main danger which faced Mattern was the formation of ice on his wings if he flew through cloud banks fog.