Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), Friday 29 June 1951, page 5


Amana's fuel free of water

Canberra. Thursday

The fuel of civil aircraft will be checked in trans-parent containers for the pressure of water, in ac-cordance with a recom-mendation by the Court of Inquiry into the crash-ing of the airliner Amana.

Mr. Anthony, Minister for Civil Aviation, said in Par-liament today that his de-partment would adopt the Court's suggestion.

Mr. Anthony said, however, that Mr. Justice Simpson, who had inquired into the crash, had reported that there was no evi-dence to suggest that there was water in the petrol supplied to the Amana at Guildford, Essen-don, or Parafield.

There was corrosion, though, in parts of No. 1 engine fuel sys-tem and in No. 4 engine fuel sys-tem.

In tabling two reports of the Count of Inquiry and a Ministerial statement on the disaster, Mr. Anthony said:

"I regret to inform the House that these painstaking inquiries have failed to reveal the primary cause of the accident."

"Two deviations"

The reports had revealed, he said, two deviations from the re-gulations, but the Court did not consider that they had played any part in causing the Amana to crash.

The irregularities disclosed

were:

. Failure to obey an air navigation order requiring the draining of of the weatherheads of the fuel

tanks at each refuelling, to drain off any water which might have accumulated in the petrol;

. The Amana had carried 8,545 feet of photographic film, though orders limited the carriage of film to 3,000 feet.