VH-UAY
de Havilland DH 50A
(c/n 137)
Another DH 50A imported into Australia in 1928, and
originally registered to the Civil
Aviation Branch. The photo above is from
my own collection, whilst the impression
immediately below was
taken from a newspaper print from the Adelaide Advertiser of
22 September 1928
showing the aircraft (as G-AUAY) in an uncompromising pose.
The caption
stated: "While attempting to land at Cook, on the
Transcontinental Railway,
on 15
September 1928, an Australian Air Force aeroplane, which was returning
to Point
Cook from a
survey tour in Western Australia, was overturned by a gust of
wind. The
machine was not
seriously damaged. It is the intention of the Air Force to send a
mechanic
to Cook to effect
repairs". Now that's interesting in that, officially, the
aircraft was operated
by the Civil
Aviation Branch, Dept of Defence and never was an Air Force
machine. Clearly
there must
have been a lot of 'give and take' between the DoD and the
RAAF. Anyway, it
most certainly was repaired and
had a series of owners all over Australia following this
incident.
In 1935 it was acquired
by Reliable Air Travel Ltd of Brisbane who named it 'Warrego'. The
image at the foot of the page appeared in the Brisbane Courier Mail for
8 March 1935 and
the caption
stated that the aircraft was commencing a new 'Western Air Service'
piloted by
Mr. F. Higginson of
Archerfield. No mention was made (at least in the caption)
to indicate
which area would be
served. In 1937 -UAY went to E.J. Stephens of Wau, New
Guinea
and at that time
its original 330 hp ADC
Nimbus engine was replaced with
a 425 hp Bristol
Jupiter
VI. The aircraft crashed on take-off from
Wau, NG,
in
December of 1941. A
month later it was
strafed by a
flight of marauding Mitsubishi A6M5's
and completely destroyed.
Retrospectively
this would appear to
have been a little overkill,
since the
pilot of the Zero, in
his wildest
dreams, could not
have considered the
poor old DH 50A as much
of a threat, either
flying, or on
the ground.
