Men Who Killed Qantas - Matthew Benns [15]
The DH86 was the plane Qantas had to have. To pull off the airmail tender Qantas Empire Airlines needed a reasonably quick, economical, four-engined plane to cover the route. The multiple engines were needed to safely cover the 825 kilometres of ocean that comprised the feared Timor Crossing. The result was the DH86, which, Fysh himself wrote in his book Qantas at War, was ‘built expressly to the order of Imperial Airways and Qantas and very much to their basic design’.2 And it was a rush job. As Fysh explained, their opponents said it could not be done in the time. But the manufacturers, de Havilland, were brilliant in their planning and production, and in only four months the DH86 was ready, obtaining its certificate of airworthiness at Martlesham Heath just one day before tenders for the operation of the new service closed. The fabric-covered, wooden biplane could carry 10 to 12 passengers and cruise at 225 kph. It became synonymous in the public’s mind with Qantas … and disaster.
Qantas Empire Airways had also agreed to let de Havilland sell its specially designed DH86 planes to Holyman Airways, the winner of the tender for the Hobart–Launceston– Melbourne airmail route. The first DH86, Miss Hobart, began flying the route on 1 October 1934 and just 18 days later the aircraft, with its two pilots and nine passengers, vanished without trace. Among those on board were a young dentist with his wife and baby, a vicar and a well-known Tasmanian horsewoman. The company’s chief pilot, Captain Victor Holyman, was on the flight as wireless operator.
Unlike the DH86 planes being delivered to Qantas, the Miss Hobart only had a single pilot configuration in the cockpit. The speculation was that the plane had plunged into the sea while Holyman tried to swap seats with the pilot and take the controls. An inquiry was launched into the mystery crash. It was adjourned to Sydney and two days in was stopped again with the devastating news of the Qantas DH86 crash at Longreach.
The crash caused enormous concern both in Australia and England. Fysh noted that Qantas, Imperial and de Havilland took the earlier successful delivery of its first DH86 by reliable pilot Lester Brain as a reason not to lose faith. ‘The Director of Civil Aviation, Edgar Johnston, and his technical staff were most unhappy and uncertain, and the public read the headlines in a state of shock. However, we had a signed contract,’ he wrote.3
Qantas contacted de Havilland for tests to be carried out on the two DH86 planes that were successfully flying there. Both of those had the original single-pilot cockpit, which Qantas had now insisted be redesigned into a two-pilot configuration. The Air Ministry testers at Martlesham Heath, de Havilland and Imperial Airways reviewed the flight tests and sent back word to Australia that the DH86 was quite air-worthy and there was no reason for the airline to discontinue flying it.
But in Australia engineer Arthur Baird was putting together another of the airline’s new DH86s that had been delivered by sea when he found the fin post was cracked. The wreckage from Longreach had exactly the same problem. He concluded it was down to mis-rigging, but tests to show this was the cause of the crash were inconclusive. Of much greater concern was the lack of directional stability at certain speeds. Qantas engineers attempted to fix this by eliminating the servo tab from the rudder. Still, aviation watchdog Johnston was worried and would not let the airline carry paying passengers on its new mail route for the first three months of operation.
Australia’s Civil Aviation Branch put aircraft designer Wing Commander Lawrence Wackett on the case. His report said: ‘This type of aeroplane has inadequate fin and rudder area to ensure prompt recovery from a spin. It is recommended that the fin be increased by four square feet and the rudder by two square feet.’4 His advice was ignored. Meanwhile, Qantas’s fourth DH86