Bert Hinkler

In 1921 Bert Hinkler intended to fly solo to Australia in his tiny Avro Avian, a plane in which he had already created a record flight across Europe. Unfortunately, a war in the Middle East prevented it so he shipped the Avro ‘Baby’ to Sydney and, on 11th April 1921, he made a record for light aircraft by flying non-stop from Sydney to Bundaberg in Queensland–his home town. He created a sensation in Bundaberg by taxiing the ‘Baby’ along the streets to park it outside the Hinkler family home. He spent about a fortnight in Bundaberg and delighted the population with his spirited aerobatics displays in which he flew under the Burnett Bridge as depicted in David Marshall’s painting.

On the way back to Sydney he ran into appalling weather which forced him to land on Anna Beach, north of the city of Newcastle, New South Wales. The tiny aircraft was undamaged and Hinkler left it parked on a sandhill while he went to seek help. Returning, he found the plane had been flipped on its back and damaged by strong winds. It had to be dragged to Newcastle by a team of horses before the battered ‘Baby’ was loaded on a ship for a less-than-triumphant return to Sydney.

He returned to England and his job as a test pilot with the Avro company before setting off again, in 1928, to fulfil his dream–fly England to Australia solo in a larger, Avro ‘Avian’ biplane.

It was the first solo flight halfway around the world. A few years later, in 1931, he flew non-stop in a de Havilland ‘Puss Moth’ from New York to Jamaica, Venezuela and Trinidad. Then he chalked up a new record, flying solo from Brazil west to east across the South Atlantic to British Gambia and on to London.

Bert Hinkler was a natural pilot who simply loved flying. He was a brilliant navigator, an inventive engineer and a practical mechanic. People wrote poetry about him, composed songs in his praise – Australia idolised him.

It was not a failure of skill, of his aircraft or his engines which abruptly halted his enviable successes. On 7th January 1933, attempting to break once more the England to Australia record for a solo flight, Bert Hinkler took off again in his trusted de Havilland ‘Puss Moth’. Only hours later he became trapped in low storm clouds and crashed to his death in the Italian Alps. It was four months before his body was recovered and he was solemnly buried with full military honours in the beautiful medieval city of Florence.

The record-breaking Avro ‘Avian’ is on permanent display in the Brisbane Museum. Alongside it, Hinkler’s Avro ‘Baby’ powered by an engine of a mere 35hp is preserved as a reminder of the days when Bert was an Avro test-pilot, a record-breaking aviator and Queensland’s hero.

Bert Hinkler, 1921