16
BAMOS May 2026
Article
The loss of the Southern Cloud
Dick Whitaker( weathersmart @ optusnet. com. au)
The Southern Cloud awaiting take off from a rural airport. The undercarriage was non- retractable, and generated significant air resistance – or drag – when in flight. Credit: State Library of Queensland.
In the early morning of Saturday, March 21, 1931, Captain Travis Shortridge, his co-pilot and six passengers boarded their aircraft VH-UMF – the“ Southern Cloud” for a routine commercial flight from Sydney to Melbourne. The weather was overcast, with a light northerly wind, and the temperature was close to 22 ° C. Soon after 8 am, the Avro Ten lifted off from Mascot aerodrome, climbed away to the south-west, and set course for Essendon airport in Melbourne. It would not be seen again for another 27 years, becoming Australia’ s first major civil aviation disaster.
During the late 1920s and early 1930s, passenger flights between Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne gradually became more common, as the public was slowly convinced that flying was safe and fast – the modern way to travel. Australian National Airways( ANA) operated daily services between the eastern capitals using their fleet of five Avro Tens, all named in honour of Sir Charles Kingsford-Smith ' s legendary Southern Cross. There were the Southern Sky, Southern Star, Southern Moon, Southern Sun and Southern Cloud – all state-of-the-art airliners manufactured by the English company Avro.
By modern-day standards, the Avro Ten was a very primitive machine, but if flown within its capabilities, it was safe and reliable. It was powered by three ponderous Armstrong Siddeley Lynx 7-cylinder air-cooled radial engines, each generating a modest 240 horsepower. It was not a small aircraft, with a length of 14.25 metres and a massive wingspan of over 21 metres, but it could only carry a flight crew of two together with a maximum of eight passengers. The cruising speed was 160 kph, but it had a top speed of about 185 kph and could reach an altitude of around 3400 metres – not a great deal higher than Mount Kosciuszko( 2228 metres).
The Avro Ten was not equipped with two-way radios, which meant that once the flight had commenced, there was no way the aircraft could be contacted, or for the aircraft to contact anyone on the ground. This shortcoming was to assume critical importance in the flight of VH-UMF.
Because civil aviation was only in its infancy, meteorological services to the aviation industry were in the early stages of development, and the fast communications required to provide an efficient amendment and update service were yet to be developed. Meteorological observations were transmitted between the various weather offices by hand-delivered telegrams, and the synoptic charts( or“ weather maps”) were only updated once a day using the 9am observations.
When Southern Cloud departed Mascot at 8am, it was carrying forecast en route weather conditions prepared the previous day, and based on observations some 12 to 24 hours old. This forecast apparently indicated no extreme conditions, although a wind change, together with some showers and thunderstorm activity, was predicted.
However, with the flight barely two hours old, the Assistant State Meteorologist in Sydney, Harold Camm, became concerned when a particularly strong cold front swept across Sydney. The following cryptic extract from the official Sydney observations recorded in the Bureau of Meteorology’ s journal notes the arrival of this front:“ March 21st 1931 – Light n’ ly wind till 9am but strong, squally westerly change at 10am with driving rain.”
Camm anxiously awaited the arrival of the 9am weather observations from Victoria, and when they finally reached the Sydney Bureau of Meteorology’ s office up on Observatory Hill