The flight is believed to have lost an engine mid-air, and the pilot of the plane is reported to have called for emergency landing while making futile, frantic efforts to sustain the aircraft with the remaining functional engine.
This time it was six long hours before a second flash corrected the first with the news that it was engine trouble and not a midair explosion that had forced Lindbergh to make an emergency landing on treacherous terrain in the mountains of western Pennsylvania.