FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1932
1932 - 0027.PDF
FLIGHT, JANUARY 8, 1932 passing over several wild deer in the swamps below. During a great deal of this trip to Belize, which was all cross-country, abso lutely nothing was seen except mile after mile of tree tops. A great deal of this flying was done at alternate high and low alti tudes, as before. About three- quarters of the way over, while flying low, we sighted a large cluster of temples slightly to the right of us, and accordingly changed our course. We flew to these and found a magnificent city entirely overgrown with trees, but sticking up very proudly and prominently. We went down and flew very low, just skimming the treetops, and secured one or two very beautiful pictures of these temples in all their majesty. As we were leaving this group, we spotted a smaller city of three temples to the south-east, and still flying low, headed off to these and photographed them also, another city as yet uncharted. By carefully noting the time on these detours, we were able to get exact compass bearings on these ruins. Leaving here, we headed once more for Belize, where we made a safe landing on the open sea and taxied up to shore at that town. That evening and all the next day, December 9, we sat down, compared our notes, charted all the courses we had flown and located all the ruins we had seen. We took off again on the morning of December 9 to Lake Yaxha, in Guatemala. At this point, we landed on the lake and located some Indians living in a nearby village. Since these Indians agreed to take us to the ruins of San Clemente, we decided to spend three days in the jungle, while the ship went back to Belize. We waved Ormsby goodbye and watched him fly away, disappearing into the clouds and leaving us alone with the Indians in the jungle. Then we set off with them, walked approxi mately ten miles to a location near the ruins, reaching there that evening. By tying up hammocks to the trees, we slept in a circle around the camp fire, with the Indians keeping the fire going all night in order to prevent the jaguars from bothering us. This was the first time that I had had to sleep in an unalloyed jungle. I was particu larly impressed with how very quiet everything was during the night, though the moment the sun began to rise, a terrible racket set up from vocal organs of the local wild life—parrots, monkeys, and many species of animals I had never seen before, including a toucan, which to me looks like a fuselage with two small wings in the rear to propel it. We did considerable ground photograph work while we were in the ruins. On several occasions, I had to crawl through tunnels on my hands and knees and take flash lights with a clearance of about three to three and one-half feet over my bent back. To crawl through a dark tunnel with a pocket torch, some electric flashlight equipment and a camera, and at the same time keep a lookout for carv ings, snakes and any other small fry lurking in the tunnel, is no small undertaking, particularly inasmuch as it is impossible to turn around quickly without banging your head against something or other in the tunnel. I managed safely, however, and secured a very fine set of pictures. One day at the temple at San Clemente, we discovered a small water well which had dried up, and, wishing to investigate it, let Gregory Mason, he being the tallest of the party, head first into a well with a long stick, while we held his feet, in order that he could poke the bottom to see if it was solid. On finding that it was, we pulled him out, and Alden Mason, the smallest of the party, jumped in and was given a torch to explore what he could find inside. Upon looking around, he located a tunnel running off and stated that he was going to walk through the tunnel, and for us to listen, in case he made any cry while in the tunnel, and to come to his assistance. When The Sikorsky Amphibian used on the expedition and flown by Robert A. Smith, at rest with its nose on the beach at Lake Yaxha, Guatemala. Its advent at first amazed the native Indian family, but they soon realised the huge bird from which white men stepped out meant no harm, and—as the picture shows—went on calmly with their daily tasks. he had penetrated the tunnel for a period of about 30 seconds, there was a tremendous commotion in there, and the light went out and a bunch of very large vampire bats made a very hurried exit from the well mouth. It seems that in stooping down to walk through the tunnel, he had bumped his head into a lot of bats hanging on the ceiling, and that they had flapped all around his head, knocking the torch out of his hand, leaving him entirely in the dark in the tunnel. It was very funny indeed to us outside, but Mr. Alden Mason did not appreciate the joke so much until he had got back into the fresh air. We spent three days this way in the jungle, tied up in the trees, and then walked back to Yaxha in time to find the Captain coming in for landing on the lake (we had to do the last three miles in canoes on the water). We paddled out to the airplane, tied the Indians in their canoes to the back of the ship and towed them across the lake. It so happened that the Captain was thoughtful enough to bring us a lot of sandwiches, together with some iced beer. Inasmuch as the natives had never seen ice, we took some ashore and gave it to them ; quickly word of the new wonder spread, and the whole village turned out to see it. On our return trip we reached Belize easily, and the following day we headed north over Lake Bacalar, which we had seen once before, and then out over the open sea once more to Cozumel Island, from where, eventually, we made for Cuba, over the Caribbean at 12,500 ft., to pick up a tail wind, passing Cape San Antonio at the east end of Cuba, and landing at Havana, our last stop before Miami. It was indeed a most interesting flight. From my obser vations, this is undoubtedly the finest way of making a preliminary survey in order to locate the compass bearings of new temples which lie half hidden in the jungle. Such compass bearings can be turned over to ground explorers who can find the best way in, and explore and photograph the ruins as they wish. It seemed to me, after my experi ence on this expedition, that with an equipment of two or possibly three ships and with participation of all the people interested in Mayan discoveries, much more effective work can be accomplished. A main supply ship, such as a Sikorsky, together with a Fairchild for photographic work, and an Autogiro of the Cierva type for landing in small spaces which the explorers could clear near the temple, would make an ideal equipment for such an expedition. During the expedition we took in all 195 aerial pictures and approximately 75 ground pictures in or around the ruins. We saw no snakes at all during the entire expedi tion, but ran across a tremendous lot of ticks, small animals which live on the limbs of trees. As you push the branches aside to go through the jungle, these little fellows drop down into your shirt and slide down as far as your belt, where they park and bite you vigorously for the period of your sojourn in the jungle. *$- ^ ffmrm ^*» -^ 27 c 2
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
