entering the sandstorm that rolled without warning from the southeast. Unable to see the ground, she had no idea of her drift and could not tell how far the wind had pushed her off course. She turned west, compounding her drift, in a vain attempt to fly around the storm.
She could do nothing but sit alone and plunge on across the great ocean of menacing, featureless sand. This was the stretch Kitty feared most. She calculated that she still had another 400 miles to fly before reaching Niamey, the capital of Niger. There, she would refuel before continuing her long distance record-setting dash to Cape Town in South Africa.
A weary numbness was creeping into her arms and legs. The never-ending roar of the engine’s exhaust and its vibration were beginning to take their toll. Kitty had been in the air almost twenty-seven hours since taking off from the aerodrome at Croydon, a suburb of London. She had flown from the cold damp of England into the dry furnace of the Sahara.
Darkness would fall in another three hours. The unfavorable wind from the sandstorm slowed her airspeed to 90 miles an hour, 30 off the 120-mph cruising speed of her old, reliable Fairchild FC-2W, a high-wing monoplane with an enclosed cockpit and cabin, powered by a Pratt & Whitney Wasp 410-horsepower radial engine.
The four-passenger aircraft had once been owned by Pan American-Grace Airways and flew scheduled mail stops between Lima and Santiago. When it was taken off the route in favor of a more advanced model that could carry six passengers, Kitty had purchased it and installed extra gas tanks in the passenger compartment. She then proceeded to set a long-distance record from Rio de Janeiro to Madrid late in 1930, the first woman to fly the Southern Atlantic Ocean.
Another hour passed while she fought to stay on her planned compass course against the buffeting wind. Fine sand seeped into the cabin and invaded the tender membranes of her eyes and nostrils. She rubbed her eyes but merely aggravated the discomfort. Worse, she could no longer see. If she became blind and could not read her instruments, it was all over.
She pulled a small canteen of water from under her seat, uncapped it, and splashed water on her face. She felt refreshed and blinked her eyes furiously, the wet sand trickling down her cheeks and drying within seconds under the harsh heat. Her vision returned, but her eyes felt as if they had needles sticking in them.
Suddenly, she sensed something, a tiny instant in time or a sound that was out of sequence, or perhaps a slight tick of silence amid the wind and exhaust of the engine. She leaned forward and studied the instruments. Every dial showed normal. She checked the fuel cocks. Each valve was in its correct position. Finally, she wrote it off to a foggy mind.
Then the infinitesimal blip in sound came again. She tensed, all her senses tuned to her ears. The sequence between the abnormal and the normal came faster now. Her heart sank as she recognized a misfiring sparkplug in one of the engine’s cylinders. Then the sparkplugs cut out one by one. The engine began to cough badly now as the tachometer needle slowly slipped backward.
A few moments later the engine stopped dead and the propeller swung still. The abrupt silence from the exhaust manifolds hit her like a shock wave. The only sound that came was the moaning rush of the wind. Kitty had no doubts. She knew absolutely why the engine had failed. The constant barrage of sand had choked off her carburetor.
The first few seconds of surprise and fear passed quickly as Kitty took stock of her limited options. If she somehow made a successful landing, she could wait out the storm and probably make repairs. The plane began to settle, and she eased the control stick forward to begin her glide to the desert below. It would not be her first dead-stick landing. She had at least seven under her belt, having crashed on two of those occasions and walked away from each with little more than
She could do nothing but sit alone and plunge on across the great ocean of menacing, featureless sand. This was the stretch Kitty feared most. She calculated that she still had another 400 miles to fly before reaching Niamey, the capital of Niger. There, she would refuel before continuing her long distance record-setting dash to Cape Town in South Africa.
A weary numbness was creeping into her arms and legs. The never-ending roar of the engine’s exhaust and its vibration were beginning to take their toll. Kitty had been in the air almost twenty-seven hours since taking off from the aerodrome at Croydon, a suburb of London. She had flown from the cold damp of England into the dry furnace of the Sahara.
Darkness would fall in another three hours. The unfavorable wind from the sandstorm slowed her airspeed to 90 miles an hour, 30 off the 120-mph cruising speed of her old, reliable Fairchild FC-2W, a high-wing monoplane with an enclosed cockpit and cabin, powered by a Pratt & Whitney Wasp 410-horsepower radial engine.
The four-passenger aircraft had once been owned by Pan American-Grace Airways and flew scheduled mail stops between Lima and Santiago. When it was taken off the route in favor of a more advanced model that could carry six passengers, Kitty had purchased it and installed extra gas tanks in the passenger compartment. She then proceeded to set a long-distance record from Rio de Janeiro to Madrid late in 1930, the first woman to fly the Southern Atlantic Ocean.
Another hour passed while she fought to stay on her planned compass course against the buffeting wind. Fine sand seeped into the cabin and invaded the tender membranes of her eyes and nostrils. She rubbed her eyes but merely aggravated the discomfort. Worse, she could no longer see. If she became blind and could not read her instruments, it was all over.
She pulled a small canteen of water from under her seat, uncapped it, and splashed water on her face. She felt refreshed and blinked her eyes furiously, the wet sand trickling down her cheeks and drying within seconds under the harsh heat. Her vision returned, but her eyes felt as if they had needles sticking in them.
Suddenly, she sensed something, a tiny instant in time or a sound that was out of sequence, or perhaps a slight tick of silence amid the wind and exhaust of the engine. She leaned forward and studied the instruments. Every dial showed normal. She checked the fuel cocks. Each valve was in its correct position. Finally, she wrote it off to a foggy mind.
Then the infinitesimal blip in sound came again. She tensed, all her senses tuned to her ears. The sequence between the abnormal and the normal came faster now. Her heart sank as she recognized a misfiring sparkplug in one of the engine’s cylinders. Then the sparkplugs cut out one by one. The engine began to cough badly now as the tachometer needle slowly slipped backward.
A few moments later the engine stopped dead and the propeller swung still. The abrupt silence from the exhaust manifolds hit her like a shock wave. The only sound that came was the moaning rush of the wind. Kitty had no doubts. She knew absolutely why the engine had failed. The constant barrage of sand had choked off her carburetor.
The first few seconds of surprise and fear passed quickly as Kitty took stock of her limited options. If she somehow made a successful landing, she could wait out the storm and probably make repairs. The plane began to settle, and she eased the control stick forward to begin her glide to the desert below. It would not be her first dead-stick landing. She had at least seven under her belt, having crashed on two of those occasions and walked away from each with little more than
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