CORAL BLASTED

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 67, Issue 243, 26 July 1947, Page 4

CORAL BLASTED

Outcrops in Apia Harbour

DARING WORK BY NEW ZEALANDERS

(P.A.) AUCKLAND, July 25. Diving repeatedly for hours at a time to lay more than 1000 charges, two chief petty officers and a petty officer of the Royal New Zealand Navy have completed the task of destroying outcrops of coral that were threatening to block shipping channels in the Apia area.

Constantly risking coral poisoning ignoring possible attacks by sharks, and taking many tumbles in the surf on jagged reefs, they performed remarkable feats in the underwater handling of powerful explosives.

The three men—Chief Petty Officer de L. A. Graham Cameron, 8.E.M., Chief Petty Officer D .W. Bell and Petty Officer J. H. Lane—landed their store of explosives from the corvette Arbutus at Apia. The first depth charges and 501 b charges were ignited by cable', but the connection was repeatedly cut on broken coral ledges and it was decided to alter the tactics by selecting the positions by diving and then dropping the charges with a waterproof safety fuse lit in shallow depths. The men reconnoitred the underwater with the aid of no equipment except eye goggles. In the deeper parts light diving gear was used.

Primer Misfires

A naval torpedoman’s cool familiarity with explosives used in the service was revealed on an occasion when the primer of a depth charge misfired. Chief Petty Officer Cameron lit the safety fuse of another primer above the water and dived with it to the depth charge 12 feet below, withdrew the faulty primer from the tube of the charge, replaced it with a new one, and escaped to a waiting dinghy. The whole operation had to be completed within six minutes.

Misfired charges could not be Ignored. After waiting for the water to clear one of the men would dive to make certain that it was safe to move the explosive. Once he was satisfied it would be secured to a line from the dinghy above and hauled to the surface. Only one charge which failed could not be recovered.