Moncrieff and Hood disappearance
On 10 January 1928 John Moncrieff and George Hood took off from Sydney in the monoplane Aotearoa to make the first trans-Tasman flight and vanished; no trace has ever been confirmed.
1928 CE · -41.00, 168.00 · status: unexplained
The account
Crowds waited at Trentham racecourse near Wellington. Some people on the New Zealand coast later said they heard an aircraft engine or saw lights that evening, which suggested the plane was close to land.
The sceptical view
The likeliest explanation is a crash at sea or in rugged country after a navigation error or engine failure; 'sightings' after the event are unreliable.
The researched reading
A pioneering trans-Tasman flight lost without trace. A ditching or mountain crash is most likely.
| Explanation | Weight | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A known natural phenomenon | 40% | The flight across the Tasman Sea in 1928, in a single-engine Ryan monoplane, faced unforecast weather; a ditching at sea or a crash in New Zealand mountains is likely. |
| Undetermined | 20% | The share a generic explanation had beyond what has been shown for this case: it fits many cases like this one, but has not been demonstrated for this one. |
| Something in the surroundings | 12% | Radio signals faded; reports of a plane heard over New Zealand suggest it may have reached land and crashed in rugged country. |
| A cultural story | 12% | A national legend in New Zealand with many unverified wreck claims. |
| Perception, memory or mind | 10% | Later reports of sightings and claims of wreckage in the Southern Alps are unreliable. |
| A hoax or fabrication | 4% | No fabrication in the core events. |
| Genuinely anomalous | 2% | A pioneering overwater flight lost is a known risk. |
Official position: Searches in both countries found nothing; the cause is unknown.