HOLED AMIDSHIPS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 210, 6 September 1927, Page 5

HOLED AMIDSHIPS.

COASTAL STEAMER TIROA.

STRUCK BY HIKURANGL

PUMPS GOING ALL NIGHT.

With a crash of splintered timber, the iron collier Hikurangi (257 tons) drove her bows into the wooden steamer Tiroa (206 tons) at the King's wharf yesterday afternoon. The Tiroa was badly holed amidships on the port side, and only continual pumping kept the steamer afloat until this morning when she went on the slipways for repairs. The Hikurangi was undamaged. The accident, which happened shortly after three o'clock, was apparently caused through the Hikurangi tailing to answer her helm as she was coming alongside the Tiroa to supply her with bunker coal. The Tiroa's hull was badly shattered from the deck to about two feet below the water line in the vicinity of the engine room.

Immediately after the smash the Tiroa began to leak badly, and at first it appeared that she might sink. A tarpaulin, weighted at the bottom, was used as an emergency collision mat. The Harbour Board's small steamer Firefloat then came alongside, and her powerful salvage pump was soon co-nnected. The water was thus prevented from rising above the Tiroa's bilges. The tug Te Awhina also stood by for a short time until it was known that her services would not l>e required. Pumping was continued during the night, and this morning the Tiroa went on the slipway. Beside? the hole in her hull, the Tiroa also suffered damage in her engine-room. The Tiroa is owned by the Gisborne Sheep Farmers' Company, and trades between Auckland and Gisborne. At the time of the accident yesterday she was unloading maize and wool, having arrived from the East Coast earlier in th<> day. The Hikurnntri is owned by J. Smith and Co., Ltd., and brings coal from Whangaroi to Auckland.

The collision was reported in the late editions of last evening's "Star."