43
Y
DID IT HAPPEN?
OU wouldn't expect to get your first flight in a helicopter in the middle of Labrador or to be peering out of it, searching for a crashed aircraft. Yet that was what happened to me in the autumn of 1953 when I was living in the construction camps of the now-completed iron-ore railway.
It was a Beaver floatplane that had crashed and it was rather an old story. The pilot, a man called Jeff, whom I had met down at "Seven Islands, had been sent up to an isolated lakeside camp to bring
out a geologist who was "bushed."
Bad weather had delayed him overnight and he had left first thing that morning. Shortly after nine he had come on the air with the announcement that he was making a forced landing on a small lake some 10 miles southeast of Menihek Dam; he had been bucking head winds alf the way and had run out of gas.
im-
Almost mediately afterwards, ac- cording to the radio operator at the Mile 290 airstrip, he had shouted thing
someTM about!
"the door" and "he's trying to jump out and then, loud and clear. They're fighting can't hold her
FORCED
LANDING
"After that there had been
silence.
290 I was billeted at Milo with the pile of the helicopter, and in Mike's view there was no doubt about the cause af the crash. The word "bushed" is used in the North le describe
man who has been
driven
of the
others
nuts by the loneliness of the life. Some get religion,
just lie in a torpor nearly all
from sume suffer persecution kind
of ¿cgree
"They're mania.
to be tricky-Hable dangerous it thwarted," Mike
then
Said And he added, "Pity they didn't let the damned geologist Jump qut of the plate if he wanted to Jeff was a friend of his.
We got away
all
The weather was bad morning and even the airlift planes that kept the forward camps supplied were grounded. But we got away about three in.
afternoon and, as we sidled north across the wind Kusts, Labrador unrolled before me like a map come to life the sobre black of stunted jack- pine and the endless, endless Jakes.
ney.
arm-
I had come up to Mile 290 by speeder and trick and Jeep-a fecezing, jolting, laborious jour- Now the miks slipped effortlessly by, as though I were seated in some
magical chair. We followed the yellow" slash of the newly constructed grade until it became intermit- tent, with machines no bigger than toys burrowing into virgin..
by Hammond
Innes
A story, set in Canoda colas Raterally from his_pen-ka knows the country well. But after trova Ling the world collecting back- ground material for his odvanture books, he knows most constrict well.
He endured the rigours of _Q Norwegian whaling camp; then hi wiste The Blue Ton. A visit to Alberto's silfields was followed b Campbell's Kingdom.
When inner takes a holiday fram travelling he pues yachting. Between Journeys he writer his books at his home in Suffolk. where he lives with his wita. Ha 12 47.
THE CHINA MAIL, MONDAY, APRIL 18, 1955,
soil, and where it ceased allo- gether and there was only a thin cut marking the proposed line
of the railway, we swung cast and began our search.
It was all lakes and muskeg, gloomy, desolate country with one stretch of water much the same as another and only luck to guide us. We had been searching for about half an hour when a Dakota came out of the north and crossed ahead
and DUNG slightly above us, blinking its landing lights. It banked steeply, circling round us, headed northwards again.
Found!
and
"I believe he's found them," Mike yelled to me above the din of the engine:
Ten minutes later we came up with the Dakota circling low down over a lake, and below I
SECOND in the series of stories by famous...... authers that will keep
you ́gaossing
* Anybody else hurt?" I called down to him.
hover.
been trying to tell me. But the lights still worked and they showed me that he was breath-
ing quite regularly. I asked him about Somers, about what had happened. For a while he didn't answer, and then he suddenly sat up and poured out a torrent of French at me,
cold prickle of fear ran up my spine.
I tried to tell myself it wasn't possible and started to reason
Who Rules Soviet Central Asia?
L
in
By WALTER KOLARZ
an
OCAL parliamentary If we take any other Central elections have recently. Asian Muslim Republic the with him, speaking slowly, dis been held in the non- picture will difter ifttle from that in Uzbekistan. We shall al- tinctly, trying to make him Russian Soviet Republies. most invariably and that the understand about the water They did not arouse in most vital State enterprises and round the plane, that he'd only terest in the world at large, the most influential positions drown or die of cold if he left for they were the usual are held by Europeans or people of European culture-Russians, the fuselage. He listened to me totalitarian plebiscite re Ukrainians, Jews, Armenians. very carefully and then said insulting
almost Georgians and others. English. "But I must go." He unanimous vote for a single uropeans, all of them deputies.
For instance, in Turkmenistan, said it mildly, but quite firmly official list of Communists
to the newly-elected Turk- "I must go or I shall be late."
Soviet, and "non-Party" candidates. menlan Suprtine "Late? Late for what?" I They did, however, pro- administer the oil trust Turk naked.
duce some interesting mennett, the railway line which crosses the Turkmenian desert, material. They caused the
flotilla on the Amu Darya local newspapers to publish river, and the State trust in lists of candidates, and by charge of irrigation work. The studying these it is possible head of the Turkmenian State
mining commission plan to discover who the im- Armenian and the Ministers of portant people in each re Finance, Local Industry and
"For my broadcast, I am broadcasting my Message to the
world tonight”--
I knew...
I don't think I have ever been public are and to what na Water Economy are "Russian.
quite so scared by anything ationality they belong. The Overwhelming
He had turned 12 the door
with a madman. Ask him if there are any casualties."
I got my door open and freeding wind from the rotor blades invaded the beated cock pit. The pilot was balanced un steadily on the fuselage, his face deathly white. There was blood on his left sleeve and his arm hung awkwardly. "Anybody else hurt?" I called down to him.
"Yes...
Somers. badly
cut."
"What about the third man?" "Andre Bernis? Oh, he's okay."
to
I reported the position Mike.
"So it's Somers, is it" He shook his head. "Pity! Fine geologist." He was frown
"Well, I suppose if he's ing. injured I'll have to take him, He obviously didn't like it after what had happened to Beaver,
The helicopter could
the
Mike,
ig
has
no
13
is strong
no
con-
man has said to me before. The result is a fascinating pic-
One must not imagine that words, spoken so quietly, told ture of the distribution of
European influence me I was shut up in that plane power among the ethnic only on the national level and
groups of the Soviet Union. that Central Asians are allow
Take the candidates for ed to exercise control at least
capital of one of Russia's scale. There ELTO European again and the whole airplane Tashkent, which is not only the on the provincial and district rocked as he drove his shoulder Mustra republics but by dar the Party and State officials even against it. I tried to stop him, largest city in Soviet Central in aras where there are but he became violen: then and Asia. In Tsarist times Tashkent European settlers. gung me off, shouting that I was Generals of Turkstan, To-day, and almost
was the scar of the Governor- One of the sparsely populated
inaccessible I couldn't understand a word against him like the others had Turkestan
Russian stituencies in the Pamir moun- been,
was! that everybody he said so I settled myself down
Garvernor-General and even tains, "the roof of the world" the word "Tur as they are often called, has Me pilot's seat to wait for against him--but that nothing Governor-Ge
would stop him. "Rien Rien de
kesian" is
prohibited
Russian Party Just sent tout," The door burst open,
as its representative szid to smack of Secretary water pouring into the fuselage, cause it
Soviet the Supreme and he stood in the gap, his hair the colonial past Under Soviet to
the Uzbek, Kazakh, Tadzhikisiøn. Joy wing: blowing in the
And
where there in areas ing out at the water that sur- Kirghiz, Tadzhik and Turk-
their European settlers to rounded the airplane. "Mon mentan republics have taken the are
branches of Influence in all Dieu He let the door slam shut place of Turkestan
local administration is absolute and looked at me accusingly. Exploitation "This is not Montreal"
But this is a constitutionally overwhelming. The Province
of Frunze, which covers "No." The
Action Soviet Central Asia is area
around the capital He became very excited then still largely controlled from
particularly and kept on asking when
we Tashkent, the headquarters of Kirghizia,
February should arrive. It was a mixed several big State-capitalistic good example. In
the Frunze Province provincial up with volumes of
Soviet. This consists of 81 as best I could and in the end bers of people and have stretched
Janda. They employ vast rem Europeans as against 52 And the Europeans he seemed to become exhausted and quietened down.
are the people who really run
Very dark
After that it began very dark. The light scattering of rain had turned to sleet and it wits beating against the fuselage with a sound like surf sucking "at shingle beach. wind rose and whipped the lake to a froth, gusts tearing at the water. I knew the helicopter couldn't
of
star-
saw the silver cross of a small only take two passen- FROMMR weather but I went on spoken very fast. I soothed him riches of the ancient Muslim
gers.
Mike agreed that aircraft spreadeagled in the I should get out and muskeg at the water's edge. Its he'd pick me up later. floa's had hit the muskeg, 11 be back inside of ing a double track through for 20 yards or so, and had then hour," he said as off, pitching the little he inched the machine touched at the root of burrowing it desp into the swamp before it had settled back the fcatoleme's port Watch the to lie flat with wings out wing stretched.
Tatort" he shouted as I jumped.
Sane forward on to its nose, down till the skids
"That's Jeff's airplane all right," Mike shouted to me
Somehow the pilot
as
he dropped the helicopter like
and I got Somers out
of the cockpit, and
Tomorrow.
Did really happen to... T. E. B.
CLARKE
?
hoping. An hour pass-
The ed. ...two hours. last of the daylight Was blanketed in snow, a dirty, driven curtain that tuned the muskeg white and eaked on the jackpine fringe of the lake..
An axe.
1959;
out tentacles into every Central "natives." Asian republic.
is
and
is
of
the
of
State Security
One of these State enterprises the Frunze Province the head
the local the huge Central Asian Coal of
the head of the Department, Combine (Sredarigol).
the KFVD,
provincial Public I spent the rest of the night operates, regardless of internal
Soviet Prosecutor and the departmental in wide awake in a state of nervous boundaries,
administers as chiefs in command of industry, tension, watching him from the republics, I was there for the
as seven different coal transport. and agriculture, to the many pilot's seat. I remember
(Fists.
chief is Andrey mention only a few. night then - not thing that worried me most was
over Dmitrievich Lebedkov, a men- In Conflict pleasant prospect, par-
an axe a bracket just
ber of the Uzbkek Communist Sicularly with a French his head, the light glinted on Its
Central Committee Canadian whom I naked blade, me guldn't talk to. The hours passed and he by
a
Its
He has now bee
been elected to
The helicopter arrived just as the Supreme Soviet of Uzbekis several influential Russiars of
will
go
a lift towards the lake. "And. into the helicopter, the wind of "there at the back of the airplane the sun rose, I told Bernis that, where he will be only one that's Je," A figure was stand the rotor tearing at us and the in a wide-eyed staring silence it would take him to Montreuy who occupy key position in crusted on the spot. After all, Jug on the fuselage, "Can't land fabric of the crashed airplane that got on my nerves, He and he climbed in, docile and
in the muskeg,
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IN ARROWENT
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10 THE LATE
LING CLONES
WYNAND FOCKINK
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MARTELL
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to fuddering under our feet. The geologist was" in a frightful state, half delirious, his face cut to ribbons. HuTy up, Jet
Mike shouted.
But the pilot hesitated. "Don't like leaving you here alone," he said to me thickly. "Guest of the Company. If anything happened.
}
"I'll be all right," I yelled and
pushed him into the helicopter.
He was on the verge of collapse. "Back for you soon,” Mike called out,
The pilot leaned down wards me. "Andre Bernis
to
he shouted. "Be careful not
to
Wide-eyed
wwwwwwwww
We
It may be argued in defence of European control that it is only of a temporary character and that the Europeans the
once qualified people can be re- He of Uzbekistan. seemed dazed by the crash; ended at Mendhek in the hutted
seemingly quite normal.
there has been a similar situa the directors of included
West African tion in British lying in a sort of torpor,
Stalin wondered what he was doing on street close by the end of the the two largest factories in
Tashkent, the
Textile and West Indian colonies where, in the past few years, more and. the airplane a sort of voyageur, half-completed dam, and when
Combine Combine and the Tashselmash, probably there to look after Mike and I were alone, I said, the biggest factory producing more
more Europesa official have local replaced by Somers. And a damned poor job That was a bell of a night he'd made of it,
had out there.”
nominees.
Eut the situation in w38 British dependent territories,
1
Afloat
agricultural machinery in Soviet been Central Asia;
the
Another new deputy to He nodded, "Sorry about that.
couldn't help Uzbek Parliament, who The weather it."
The
the
He didn't seem very con- elected not in Tashkent itself which are moving towards self- cerned and began telling me but in one of the provinces, is government, is not comparable At length I went to sleep and about the injured, men
Fyodor Pavlovich Leksashey, with that of the Soviet ter- woke, cold and stiff, some hours pilot had been flown ofit un-chief of the Central Asian Ofi ritories in Central Asia. There is no doubt that under the later to a sense of movement conscious. And of Somers, he Combine (Sredaźneft). He is in Soviet regime a vast and the sound of water. I peer- said, "It's queer how it takes supreme charge not only of all ed out. It was moonlight and them..
wanted me to believe existing oil wells in Central people have been
in all' the lake had risen, covering the it was the Frenchman who was Asia, but also of all future oll important
the Central Asian muskeg. The airplane rocked 'bush.'"
prospecting.
that the native. Muslim in gently, almost afloat.
telligentsia has developed bath. in quality and quantity.
WORLD COFYRIGHT. RESERVED
"Dover
OF
for
key posities and
In Their Grip There are so many Russian and other European deputies in
But it is these local Central the new Uzbek Supreme Soviet Asian political and intellectual that it is impossible to mention leaders who again and again come into.conflict with the Cen- Government and bold positions which enable tral them to keep the entire country therefore
There was metallic rattle" behind me and I turned. The Frenchman was standing up in
story, Saturday's the dim-lit cavern of the fuse- The rotor roared, drowning lage wrestling with the handle Incident actually happened to them all. Among them they his words and almost blowing of the
with his panel helicopter was up and away and shoulder, "Keep still!" I shouted
me into the muskeg, Then the pressed-st thrusting at the Nigel Balchin.
there
Now, did Hammond lanes It was suddenly quiet and very at him, I was afraid he would make this story up or did it lonely
on the lakeside. roll the bottom of the docr. really happen to him? The sky was leaden, the water under, All the airplane with FACT or FICTION? and trees black-looking. It had water. begun to rain.
Down below in
the stubby fuselage I found Andre Bernis stretched out on a pile of kit. "You all right?" He stared at me with wide, unwinking eyes, not moving, For
But he took no nolice, intent only on getting out of the plane. I struggled out of my borrowed sleeping-bag and started to pull him away from the door. And ghastly then it struck me the moment I thought he was dead, wanting to get out and me pull- that that was what the pilot had ing him back from the door! A
*
mian
morrow.
Periodically
are
The
rerezi Procurements the Uzbek Prime Minister,
of Gallan (name,
in their . For stance. A meyed from the plenipotenary of the Ministry most Is it See to- nae
Hla · Unnanf Yusupov. He was dis- oake
the cotton, rice missed in December, 1954, for and wheat from the hundreds of alleged inefficiency, and did not collective farms throughout the even stand as a candidate for
the elections country. And those who fail to
to the Supremei 1 the supply quejas are dealt Soviet. with by "the otice the Pubile As long as the ranks of the Prosecutor whose chief is drain local qualified cadres continue a Balropean, is the with 4 to be depleted By purges the Polish-sounding name, Yainkot- Baxropeals will, of decessity,
remain in control.
DID IT REALLY HAPPEN? No. 2: Forced Landing
YES
NO
10B00
control
THE MANY SIDES OF JIM BAILEY
Johannesburg.
M. Bailey went missing
ILLIONAIRE Jim
From Donald Wise ¿HMH
Last week Jim senti airplanes wheeling over Channesburg's -sking to shover {down leaflets urging the shanty towpers to
again the other day. One weekly newspaper are the Bailey, the mining white-man-Bas government by his lated tabibid, "Golden
"
anyotherwise
has threatened to trim Bailey's City Post They minute he was sprawled be- voice of Africans in the millionaire.
newsprint allocation once," for hind his butter coloured land of Strydom the lion,
Such activities in a multi- example, Because he printed i A he sa moodily find his desk in a pair of frightful where it is not always wise racial, multi-prejudice land like picture Eleanor Roosevelt while deskto old flannels and a short to speak. "I Air their South Africa need careful staff shaking hands with a Negro. empty room, the first 20,000 sleeved shirt. His
staff grievances for them," he work More often than not it "Drum's" reporters are prob. copies disappeared quicker than were waiting to worry him says.
is essential that his right hand ably the most beaten-up worms in a fowl run!! operates quite secretly and in- team ine the world. They The kick he was getting out with their chores. Then he
He hopes to win over the dependently of his left.
have been whipped by of the first editions to roll off was gone.
millions who believe that so far, like most things that white farmers worlding con Communism is the answer to this 36-year-old ex-RAF fighter Vict labour gangs, flogged the presses was wearing off, Ha Jim Bailey is a weird, their problems of un pilot touches, his "African voices Howard Hughes type. His employment, poverty and are in fine fettle. moves are harder to predict disease. than a jumping bean..
Conferences take place
anywhere." "He is never on
His first magazine "Drum" appeared five years ago, beating
ཀཎྜ -
vanished.
wine growers who keep their workers permanently boozed
He reappeared briefly ata part payment, locked up by party, curled round a glass of police when they tried to ex beer, an obvious bachelor target pose the notorious third degree for every pretty girl in the in South Africa's mole.
After that — éllence,
This is Jim Bailey's unist Jim's next magazine was way of life, so no one is wor-
for South Africa's 9,000,000 non- whites, of whom some 65,000 now, buy it every month. Its 40 time, He can rarely be That is one aide of him pages in and society, sportar found when wanted in a only. He also farms sheep eays on the West Coast and Africa, glossy, pinuppity red. They just know he is and scandal can be bought in hurry
He juggles large financial almost anywhere south of the job ball of lvunce, with fewer being a horse breeder or a holdings. He breeds horses. Sahara.
Dim-type articles on child sheep-farmer
Anancier
His publications
magazines,
two He is busy being the son of it he not been
life, education, and a home building somewhere else for a little one tabloid the late, fabulous Sir. Abe store than once, the Infatical It in doing well.