Word: first
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...bizarre coincidence, it was 50 years to the day-Nov. 28, 1929-since Commander Richard Byrd and three companions struggled across the region's perilous mountains, to complete the first flight over the South Pole in a Ford trimotor called the Floyd Bennett. Flight 901 was scheduled to be far more comfortable, cruising at 35,000 ft., well above any turbulence, descending only in spots to 6,000 ft. for a closer look at the scenery. All the while, the cabin crew kept the sightseers plied with plentiful food and drink. Lunch offered a choice of Tournedos Rossini...
...defective. Though the exact cause of the crash remained undetermined at week's end, suspicions centered on possible pilot error. Captain Jim Collins, 45, was a flyer of 21 years' experience with a reputation for being "the epitome of a non-risk taker," but it was his first flight on that particular polar route. One theory was that he may have been battered by a sudden "cat"-a burst of vicious clear-air turbulence. Others speculated that Collins might have been the victim of the most treacherous hazard in polar flying: a "whiteout," when blowing snow can cause...
...went on: "The Russian tactics in Africa are like the tactics of a parrot climbing a tree. First came Angola, then Congo Brazzaville, then Ethiopia, and afterward the Sahara. Step by step. If they get the Sahara, the Russians will have a window on the Atlantic, as they have always wanted, and the key to the Mediterranean. The American Sixth Fleet will have to sail back home and leave these seas to the Russian fleets...
...least technically, the country's lawful acting President, Congress named a new interim chief executive. She is Lydia Gueiler Tejada, 53, a veteran leftist politician and an accountant by profession. Diplomatic observers in La Paz suspect that sooner or later-and it probably will be sooner-the first female to serve as the country's chief executive will be pushed through the revolving door of Bolivian politics...
...world's most gerontocratic elites is getting older rather than younger. Meeting in Moscow last week, the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party elevated First Deputy Premier Nikolai Tikhonov, 74, from alternate to full membership in the Politburo, thereby raising the average age of that 14-member body from 69.3 to 69.6 years...