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Navy Man Admits Offering Services

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Commander Ralph D. Weyerbacher, left, Maj. Henry Leonard, center, and Commander Garland Fulton, as Weyebacher appeared before the naval court of inquiry in Washington yesterday. Weyerbacher admitted that he offered his services as technical adviser to an airplane manufacturing company. 
[(AP) Wirephoto]

COURT HEARS NAVAL MAN
Officer Admits He Offered Services as Advisor to Aircraft Concern
  WASHINGTON, Feb. 15. (AP)-To a naval court of inquiry, Commander Ralph P. Weyerbacher, naval aircraft procurement officer, acknowledged today he and another officer had offered their services as technical advisors to the Cairns Development Company and Cairns Airplane Company of Naugatuck, Ct.

OFFER TOLD
  The officer said he made the offer for himself and Lieut. C. B. Harper, now retired, in a letter to J. L. Livermore, Wall-street operator, who then was backing the inventions of Edmund B. Cairns.
  The court of inquiry is making an investigation at the behest of a House committee.
  Weyerbacher said he had "no consciousness of having committed any unethical, much less illegal act."

TELLS RULING
  Weyerbacher said he had obtained a ruling from the Navy Judge Advocate General that it was permissible to serve as advisor to a private concern if it did not interfere with his Navy duties. 
  Capt. W. W. Wensinger, acting as prosecutor for the court, contended Weyerbacher's action brought "suspicion" and "discredit" upon the Navy.

Macon Fault Declared Known Prior to Cruise
(Continued from First Page)
ficial knowledge of a weakness in the last-built of the nation's huge lighter-than-air ships.

CRASH AND LURCH
  Davis testified more by inference than directly as to the fin weakness, his exact language being that he considers the fins "the most important part of the ship."
  He was in the habit of inspecting them whenever the Macon encountered rough weather, he said and did so Tuesday when the ship encountered squalls.
  While there he heard a crash, followed by a lurch "too sharp and short" for a gust of wind, which may have been caused by a sudden "tipping over" of the rudder of because fin supports gave way.
  Davis is of the opinion, his testimony disclosed, that the upper fin collapsed first and tore loose from the main structure, causing the rear girders to collapse, their crumbling, in turn, ripping out the two gas cells which burst, sending the Macon out of control.

CELL RIPPED BY GIRDERS
  He said he actually did not see any structural defect, but "when I heard the crash it sounded as though the fin structure was pulling out of the frame where it is bolted to the main girders." Cell No. 1, he said, "must have been ripped by the girders."
  With this explanation before them, members of the board of inquiry wanted to know more about the previous trouble with the fin.
  It occurred, Davis declared, while the Macon was over Texas on its way to the Caribbean Sea to join the United States Fleet in last spring's maneuvers. Two diagonal girders sheared off below the port fin, Davis testified. Temporary repairs were made at the time, followed by "permanent strengthening" when the dirigible reached Florida.

BUMP ON PORT FIN
  "Was that Texas casualty extraordinary?" he was asked.
  "It was the first on the Macon. We had hit bumpy weather over Texas and I would say that the break was caused by an upper bump on the port fin."
  John D. Reppy, lieutenant junior grade, leaned to the gust-of-wind theory, testifying that he felt a lurch he attributed to that cause and immediately went into the stern, where he discovered two gas cells deflating and:
  "Frame No. 17, where the upper fin is attached forward, was completely severed. There was no trace of the upper walkway, which terminates there also. The ship was completely open in the upper stern. I could see only a small part of the rear of the upper fin still attached to the frame."
  Commander Herbert V. Wiley asked Reppy if the lurch he felt was not caused by a casualty to the controls. Reppy replied he did not think so. Commander Wiley, it has been indicated, holds to the same theory of faulty design as does Lieutenant-Commander Scott Peck.

SUNNYVALE EMPLOYEES EXPECTED TO KEEP JOBS
  WASHINGTON, Feb. 15. (AP)-Representative McGrath of San Mateo, Cal., said after a conference with high Navy Department officials today employment will be provided for civil employees at the Sunnyvale airship base.
  There are about 200 civil service employees at the base, where the ill-fated Macon, lost off Point Sur February 12, formerly was based.
  "Perhaps some of those now employed at Sunnyvale will be transferred temporarily," McGrath said, "to other naval stations. If that becomes necessary it will be only temporarily and as few transfers as possible will be made.
  "None will be let out, I am informed."

NEW DIRIGIBLE URGED BY HOUSE LEADER
  WASHINGTON, Feb. 15. (U.P.)-Immediate construction of a new airship to replace the Macon was advocated today by Representative Clarence J. McLeod, Republican of Michigan, ranking minority member of the House Appropriations Committee.