ASN Wikibase Occurrence # 74158
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| Date: | Monday 6 August 1951 |
| Time: | afternoon |
| Type: | Auster J/5 Adventurer |
| Owner/operator: | Mission Aviation Fellowship Lutheran Mission |
| Registration: | VH-KAN |
| MSN: | 2919 |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 1 / Occupants: 1 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed |
| Location: | Asaroka Gap, Eastern Highlands -
 Papua New Guinea
|
| Phase: | En route |
| Nature: | Ferry/positioning |
| Departure airport: | Asaroka Gap, Papua New Guinea |
| Madang, Papua New Guinea (AYMD) | |
| Confidence Rating: |  Information is only available from news, social media or unofficial sources |
Early on 7 May 1951, without fanfare, an Auster Autocar lifted off from Madang on the New Guinea north coast, and set course inland. At the controls of VH-KAN was a quietly spoken Australian, a veteran of WWII B-24 anti-submarine operations.
Just how demanding is the combination of terrain and weather in that part of the world was driven home emphatically only three months after that first MAF flight, on 6th August, when the Auster and its pilot, Harry Hartwig, failed to return from a day’s flying into the Highlands.
The fate of the radio-less aircraft and its pilot might have forever remained a mystery, had not a New Guinean schoolteacher (at a mission outpost near the Asaroka Gap) seen an aircraft that afternoon circling in and out of cloud, before hearing an impact on the mountain. Immediately he dispatched two boys to carry the message to Asaroka, but it would still be another day and a half before the aircraft and the body of its pilot was located, 300 feet below the Gap.
Sources:
1. http://www.australianflying.com.au/news/a-look-back-at-60-years-of-mission-aviation-fellowship
2. http://www.edcoatescollection.com/ac1/austcl/VH-KAN.html
3. http://austerhg.org/prod_list/pages.php?page=2800
4. https://www.crosswalk.com/525224/
History of this aircraft
Other occurrences involving this aircraft
| 6 May 1951 | VH-KAN | Goroka Gap, Eastern Highlands | |
unk |
Revision history:
| Date/time | Contributor | Updates |
|---|---|---|
| 01-May-2010 23:14 | Petro | Added |
| 08-Apr-2014 20:46 | Dr. John Smith | Updated [Time, Aircraft type, Cn, Operator, Total fatalities, Other fatalities, Location, Departure airport, Destination airport, Source, Narrative] |
| 25-Jun-2023 09:09 | Ron Averes | Updated [[Time, Aircraft type, Cn, Operator, Total fatalities, Other fatalities, Location, Departure airport, Destination airport, Source, Narrative]] |
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