WAITED TO SEE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 57, 8 March 1932, Page 3

WAITED TO SEE.

AORANGI ARRIVES LATE.

NO VISIBILITY YESTERDAY. " REAEIiY EXCEPTIONAL " STORM. " CAPTAIN PRAISED BY PASSENGERS Enveloped in a blanket of fog and , mist and driving into high head seas, j the Union Company's Aorangi was liover to 24 miles oft' Mokohinau Island, at the ' entrance: to the Hauraki Gulf practically 1 all day yesterday. Consequently, when t she arrived in the harbour from Sydney , at 11 o'clock last night, she was 17 hours • behind schedule. The Aorangi anchored ! in the stream for the night, and, after \ being cleared this morning by the port | officials, berthed at the Prince's wharf shortly after S a.m. The Captain's Story. "We came across a cyclone as we came towards Cape Brett about one o'clock yesterday morning, but managed to pick up the light," said Captain Spring Brown, commander of the Aorangi. "We steamed on a course for Mokoliinau, but the storm got fiercer and the weather thicker. We could not pick up Mokoliinau light, so turned the ship's head to sea to wait for daylight. The rain became thicker, and the wind reached storm force, and a dirty south-east gale developed. The sea was of the shortsteep variety. The ship's head was kept to tile storm, with the engines going slow. When she was hove-to, she rode the storm like a duck, being in nice trim. "At 3 p.m. yesterday the sea and wind had not moderated, but the visability had improved, and we could see for eight miles. It was then decided to make for port. It was really an exceptional piece of weather, to say the least." Questioned regarding the use of the ship's direction-linder, Captain Spring Brown said it had functioned quite well, but the only radio station heard was that at Auckland. It was impossible to find the Aorangi's exact position till the fog lifted. Had he been able to make a landfall he could have made port quite easily. When the ship's head was turned for port she was 20 miles ofT the land. Thick as Pea Soup. "It was as thick as pea soup, and at times you could not see the fo'castle

head," said a deck-hand. "The high, confused seas had a break on them occasionally, and it was impossible to tell where we were. As long as the ship's head was turned towards the open Pacific there was no danger. We did not want another Wairarapa disaster, and the skipper was wise in taking the course he did." Passengers Praise Seamanship. Passengers who were interviewed paid a tribute to the seamanship displayed by Captain Spring Brown and his officers. Although they were disappointed at not making Auckland on time one and all agreed that the only thing to be done under the circumstances was done. "It takes a strong man to his foot down and say, 'No, I won't go on till the weather clears,'" said a world traveller who is going home to New York. "That was the position the commander was in yesterday. My wife and I have travelled over many seas, but seldom, if ever, have we struck such weather as we did yesterday. Of course, all of us wanted to make port, but we realised that it was much safer to be where we were than to be poking about the islands of the gulf in such weather. Some of the seas j which hit the steamer were so heavy that she quivered from stem to stern.'' I

of the " old hands" on the Aorangi said that not since her maiden voyage, when the vessel struck a cyclone between Vancouver and Honolulu, had she experienced such weather. The wind was not so forceful, but the seas were just as tempestuous, and the Aorangi rode the storm out in the same way as she did when she first made her bow to the Pacific Ocean.