He landed briefly at Torquay, before continuing on to Port Melbourne in a flight of 4 hours 10 minutes. Strong winds kept him grounded in Stanley for a day, but on Tuesday 16 December, 1919, he successfully flew across Bass Strait. He took off from Launceston, landing at Stanley nearly 3 hours later. In December 1919 more flying history was created when Lieutenant Arthur Long completed the first flight across Bass Strait. This is adjacent to the monument for the 80th anniversary.
In 2010 on the one hundred year anniversary, a new monument was erected in Diggers Rest dedicated to the flight. He made three successful flights and reached an altitude of 100 feet. In the Melbourne Argus the following day a statement confirming the flight was published under the names of nine witnesses. He and his mechanic Antonio Brassac waited for still conditions to attempt the flight. He brought out a Voisin biplane, (a plane with two pairs of wings), and based himself at Diggers Rest, just outside Melbourne, for the attempt. Houdini toured widely in Europe and USA and came to Australia in 1910 where he performed a number of death defying stunts including a leap from Queen’s Bridge Melbourne, with his hands cuffed behind him,as reported in The Argus.
He became a magician, but rose to fame as an escapologist, freeing himself from chains, handcuffs, jails and straightjackets. On 18 March 1910, Harry Houdini, the world famous escapologist, made what is claimed to be the first controlled powered flight in Australia.īorn in Hungary in 1874 as Ehrich Weiss, Houdini emigrated to the United States with his family in 1878.
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