lightning bird
21st May 2014, 20:46
Just read a book called Kalahari by a Michael Main, nothing to do with aviation, but a few, very intriguing aviation related paragraphs or two, and just wondering if I could start a thread on it, cause some of it is very interesting and would love to learn more...
Anyway what I read in my own summary...
During the Second World War, October 1943. Two young pilots, Adamson and Edwards, flying out of what was then Southern Rhodesia, ran out of fuel and crash landed in the middle of Makgadikgdi pans, in Botswana, a very desolate and unforgiving place.
They did not know the country and were ill equipped to deal with the fate that awaited them. A group of Bushmen had been hunting, perhaps illegally, nearby. They may have thought that that these two represented law and and order, but took them in. During the night however, both aviators were murdered.
One was shot the other killed with an axe, possibly his own, bodies burnt. Not until 8th november the aricraft was spotted and the search began. Once the guesome story was pieced together, eight bushmen were arrested. But in the absence of bodies and of sufficient evidence, they were aquitted.
Does anybody know more about this, or why that particular flight was taking place..
Anyway what I read in my own summary...
During the Second World War, October 1943. Two young pilots, Adamson and Edwards, flying out of what was then Southern Rhodesia, ran out of fuel and crash landed in the middle of Makgadikgdi pans, in Botswana, a very desolate and unforgiving place.
They did not know the country and were ill equipped to deal with the fate that awaited them. A group of Bushmen had been hunting, perhaps illegally, nearby. They may have thought that that these two represented law and and order, but took them in. During the night however, both aviators were murdered.
One was shot the other killed with an axe, possibly his own, bodies burnt. Not until 8th november the aricraft was spotted and the search began. Once the guesome story was pieced together, eight bushmen were arrested. But in the absence of bodies and of sufficient evidence, they were aquitted.
Does anybody know more about this, or why that particular flight was taking place..