During this time in the fog they had two mishaps. One of their engine exhaust pipes split open and made a machine gun like noise while spitting flames out of the engine. Other than being a bit rattled the men and the plane were fine, however the noise and the flames continued the rest of the flight.

Another issue was the cold. Both men wore battery powered heated leather jackets but their batteries ran low and they started freezing in the open cockpit. They were also unable to move to warm themselves up as they were crammed into the small seat and it did not allow any room for movement.

They hit another large bank of clouds and it created intense turbulence that threw the Vimy around as like was nothing. Alcock and Brown both felt extreme discomfort as their stomachs jumped up and down. The turbulence coupled with the heavy fog made them feel as though the plane was motionless when all of a sudden they were sent in a nose dive straight towards the ocean! Alcock felt himself being pressed to the back of his seat and glanced at the altimeter. In just moments they went from 4,000 feet in altitude down to 1,000 feet and continued falling. At this moment neither Alcock or Brown were too worried and Alcock later remarked that his only thought was, “However shall we get back on our original course and avoid being lost in the endless waste of the Atlantic?” The altimeter read 100 feet and Alcock estimated that they were only 65 feet above the ocean when he regained control! Brown was later asked how they reacted to this and he simply replied, “We grinned!”

The weather was starting to change and the flight was becoming much smoother. Alcock opened the throttle wide open and quickly regained their height and brought them back on course. Both men now realized that they were hungry, Alcock communicating this to Brown by pointing his left hand at his mouth that he was closing and opening. Brown retrieved their meal of sandwiches and opened the bottle of beer that they brought along. They ate and shared the beer then threw the bottle overboard.

Brown then had to refuel the main tank from the reserve tank, a task he was glad to have. Manually pumping fuel from the reserve to the main tank made him move and warm himself up.

Five hours of flying was now behind them and so was the sun. Brown now having a chance to calculate their position pulled out his sextant and began his calculations. Brown was astonished to see that they were only a little off course to the South.

Soon they were again enveloped by a huge cloud and had no visibility. Being deafened by the Vimys engine with the shot exhaust Brown wrote in his logbook, “Can you get above the clouds by 9:30? We need stars as soon as possible.” Alcock nodded his head and continued climbing higher but was unable to overcome the cloud cover. By 12:05 AM they still were not able to find any relief from the clouds and Brown showed Alcock his logbook again saying, “Must see stars now.” Alcock opened the throttle and tried gaining altitude as quickly as possible.

At 12:15 AM Alcock dug his hand into Brown’s shoulder and pointed up. The moon and the star Polaris were visible. Brown had his sextant and his navigational charts out so quick it almost made Alcock’s head spin. Brown determined that they were still flying a little bit to the South but were making great time, averaging about 106 knots (122 MPH).

At 12:30 AM they had another break of sandwiches and coffee. Brown opened the bottle of whiskey they had brought and poured some into his coffee and began singing. Alcock could not hear Brown over the noise of the engines but found it amusing nonetheless.

By this time some of the Royal Aero Club members were beginning to worry. No one had sighted the Vimy since they took off and they had not received any radio transmissions from them. Neither Alcock nor Brown realized that their radio transmitter was broken shortly after takeoff, only finding out after their trip was over.

At 3:00 AM dawn was beginning to approach and with it a new danger. They were engulfed by another huge bank of clouds and this time they were being pelted with freezing rain. Alcock lost control of the plane again and they went into a nosedive towards the ocean. Watching the altimeter quickly drop to below 1000 feet Alcock pulled hard on the stick and regained control at the last second. He later said that he could taste salt on his lips from the ocean foam below and stated, “In any case the altimeter wasn't working at that low height and I think that we were not more than 16 to 20 ft. above the water.”

The icy rain had now turned to hail and then to snow, filling the cockpit and freezing the men further. Worse was that sheets of ice were starting to form on the Vimy and the engines were starting to run irregularly. Alcock and Brown both new that this ice build up could cause the engines to stop at any moment. Brown climbed out of the cockpit and began crawling onto one of the wings towards the engine. Realizing what Brown was doing Alcock stood up and grabbed him to hold him back, but Brown freed himself and continued on. He ripped off his flight goggles so he could see better, but was immediately met with discomfort by the freezing wind whipping at his face. With his stiff leg and no real way to support himself if he fell Brown inched his way across the planes wing and scraped the ice off of the engine’s intakes. Then he crawled back and across the other wing to do the same thing. He crawled back and forth between engines four times in order to keep them clear of ice. The entire time Alcock flew the plane as steady as possible knowing that one wrong move could send Brown plummeting into the ocean and likely to his death.