When the "Bremen" made a forced landing on Greenly Island in 1928, the first Canadian aircraft to reach the scene was piloted by Duke Shiller and the second machine was flown by the Canadian Transcontinental
Airways Company Chief Pilot - Romeo Vachon who arrived two days after with a group of
media representatives. Both Schiller and Vachon were flying Fairchild FC-2W machines. Gretta May Ferris, a nurse from St. John, New Brunswick who was posted at nearby Forteau 's Grennfell Medical Station, traveled by dogsled some fifteen miles to attend to the crew's medical needs. She was first to
write the story that was picked up by the international media saying that the "Bremen" had landed and that the crew was safe.
According to Eddie Jackson's notes the weather was bad from the beginning of their return flight and quickly deteriorated. As they neared Murray Bay, they were
forced to reduce altitude because of dense cloud cover and decided to fly along the St. Lawrence River till they reached their destination. According to Eddie you could open the plane door and step on the side of a mountain-they were that close. They, according to Eddie's notes, were in a storm front with headwinds gusting over 85 mph.
"The instrument panel was shaking so bad nobody could read the gauges, a minute later a screw came loose from it and struck me in the face. The pilot (Vachon) pointed to the right wing strut which was vibrating like mad even though by looking at the ground, we seemed to be standing still. Snow and ice was so thick we could only see
down Are we going to crash? I asked Vachon, 'hell no' was his reply - even though he looked plenty worried. Fernstrom sat in the back seat not saying a word, I wasn't feeling too good about things either."
According to his notes, they made two unsuccessful attempts to land on a small frozen lake but the ice cover was too thin, evidenced by black areas seen from the air. The next choice was a snow covered ridge which looked, according to Eddie, "like the side of the mountain-with a fence line running through it. When we starled to come in, I noticed that Vachon had lifted his feet and legs into the air-then we hit the ground with a crash and I could feel the bottom of the plane buckle under my feet. The plane went back in the air and crashed
again on the ground and starled
The plane was reportedly not seriously damaged, but it took two days to get it ready to fly again. According to Eddie, they paid the farmer for the two fences that they ran through and another one that had to be dismantled so they would have enough room to take-off, which they did, according to Eddie, in about 75 feet, downhill, in footpacked snow.
Leaving Canada on the final leg of their flight their compass finally quit altogether,
ground, we seemed to be standing still. but the day was clear over the White Mountains of New Hampshire and with an indicated air speed of 100 mph and stable air to fly in they decided to go all the way to Governor's Island, which was the nearest landing field to the Daily News newspaper offices in Manhattan. Accordingly to Eddie, the trip, the fiights and the expense was worth it all.
Eddie had 'scooped' all the other newspapers and the Daily News ran a special edition
of the Bremen crash with his photos. Eddie further states that he thinks the Daily
News made over $400,000 selling the photo rights to papers around the world.
