NavList:

Gary LaPook you wrote: "When Alcock and Brown flew their Vimy bomber across the Atlantic in 1919 it was necssary to climb out on the wing to chip ice from the engine carburator air intake. Then walk back in, climb back into the cockpit (try to warm up a bit) then climb out onto the other wing to do the same. They had to do this numereous times, over the dark and freezing Atlantic!"

Gary. I was wondering where you got that story from.  Unfortunately, Brown’s ‘Out of the cockpit exploits’ have been increasingly exaggerated for effect over the years by the media looking for an improved story.  This is a pity, because what Brown actually did was equally worthy.  If we look at Brown’s own account (photographed below) published shortly after the flight we see that the pair relied upon observing the fuel overflow gauge, which was located outside the cockpit to check that all was well with the engine carburation.  During a snowstorm the face of the gauge became covered in snow when during the prevailing weather conditions, it was essential that it could be read.  Therefore, Brown climbed several times onto the top of the fuselage to clear the snow from the face of the gauge, which was sufficiently brave without further need of poetic license.

The reason the ‘wing walking’ story’ has been a left uncorrected is because Alcock was killed in a flying accident shortly after the flight, and Brown’s health began to suffer into the 1940s accentuated by the death of his son, a Mosquito pilot, in 1944 such that he never made any successful attempt to correct it before his death from an accidental ‘Veronal’ (barbital) overdose aged 62 in 1948.  Dave P

File:

File:

File: