MAN OVERBOARD

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 42, 19 February 1931, Page 12

MAN OVERBOARD

LONG RESCUE EFFORT

UNAVAILING IN END

(By Telegraph.) (Special to "The Evening Post.") . AUCKLAND, This Day. News of an exhausting ordeal undergone oil a wild and rugged part of the coast of British . Columbia by three members of a launch party, two from Australia and one a former resident of Auckland, was received in Auckland yesterday by the Pacific Cable Board from its Bamfield station, where the men were employed. One of the men, H. W. Fitzpatriek, of Queensland, was washed off the rooks on Copper i Island and drowned. The nther members of the party were H. J. Fox, whoso parents reside at" 38, Prospect terrace, Mount Eden, and C. A. J. Barden, of Australia. The men were returning from Port Alberni to Bamfield in a launch last Saturday evening. ..When four miles from Bamfield it was found that Fitzpatrick had fallen overboard. Cries were heard from him, but itvwas some time before hi« plight was noticed. The other men then saw. him holding on to the side of- the boat, and for three hours they struggled to get him aboard. They were hampered by his size and also by the cold winds and sea. Fitzpatrick became numb with the cold, and was unable to help himself. Fox and Barden swam ashore with their unconscious companion, and dragged him as far as possible up the rocks n Fox swam out to tho launch, lost touch with his companions, and anchored close to some rocks for the night. Meanwhile Barden had fainted from the effects of cold and exhaustion, and on coming to in the early hours of the morning he could find, no trace of Fitzpatriek. He attracted the attention of a passing fishing boat, and was able to reach the cable station in safety. Fox, who was seen by a passing boat, was also rescued. Fitzpatriek's body was found in a little bay on Copper Island. It is surmised that he was washed from the rocks by the tide. He was well known in Auckland, where he had served on the cable steamer Iris.