biography
| name: |
Smith, Sir Ross Macpherson
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1892–1922)
|
| biography:
| Aviator, born in Semaphore, Adelaide, South Australia. The most decorated pilot of the Australian Flying Corps, which he joined in 1916, he was the first pilot to fly over Jerusalem, when he took T E Lawrence to meet Sharif Nazir. After the war he flew a Handley-Page bomber from Cairo to Kolkata (Calcutta), a record distance of nearly 2400 mi, to survey an air route from England to Australia. In 1919 for a £10 000 prize, he and his brother Keith (1890–1955) flew from London to Darwin in 28 days in a Vickers Vimy bi-plane, a feat for which they were both knighted. He was killed in a trial flight of a Vickers Viking amphibian plane. |
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