WIRELESS WARNING

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 87, 13 April 1933, Page 5

WIRELESS WARNING

WAR-TIME INCIDENTS.

TROOPSHIPS RECALLED. " 5.0.5.» FROM KTJAHINE. I (Experiences as a listener-to' In;- the early days of wireless telegraphy . were related to the Wellington' Rotary . Club by Mr. Clive Drummond, announcer at 2YA.

As one connected with - wireless '.telegraphy since its infancy in New Zealand, Mr. Drummond told of the silent watches at station VX/W on Mount Etako (commonly, known as the Tinakori wireless station), when.some three steamers of the intercolonial fleet and the trans-ocean liners were' the only vessels fitted with wireless sets.' There was then no such thing as,amplification by valves; all the reception .was- with crystals, and one had r to - listen' very attentively, as the signals were very faint indeed. Still, in- those ! days it was interesting to pick up - messages from ship to ship, and ship .to _; shore all Morse, of course.

Important interception. "When tli© Great War 'broke out' VLW became a naval base, and all other.sets were sealed down," said Mr. Drammond. "VLW became a listening station, and ■some ratter remarkable • messages .were picked up. There are . many who will remember the first troopships, leaving New Zealand. There was.a big;review in Newtown Park on the Saturday, after which the troops embarked ready- to leave at break of dawn on -the Sunday. That Sunday night a message with- the DA prefix. (German Navy) was picked up. It was a message of 16 words (10letter words)-received-at 35 words to the -minute.

"Tiits message was not only transmitted to th© naval adviser" (Captain Hall Thompson), but was- sent on to Sydney and Melbourne. It was unquestionably a message from one of the German cruisers then at ■ liberty in the Pacific. The code was deciphered at Melbourne and as the result the troopships • were recalled to Wellington and Auckland, and it was some time before they actually sailed. 'Wahine to the Rescue. "About the same time the Ruahine left .Wellington with a full cargo of produce for London," said Mr. Drummond. "When she was about 200 miles to the eastward of New Zealand, an S.O.S. message was picked up at 4.55 a.m. one day. There was four feet of water in the Ihold and the vessel had a list "As you can guess, Sunday morning is-one of the, most awkward times for anything,like that to happen, as people go away for week-ends and the offices are all shut for the day. At last we fot" Mr. D. A. Aiken, of the Union teamship Company. There were only

two vessels capable of rendering assistance —the Westralia and the Wahine. At first Mr. Aiken did not like the idea of risking sending the Wahine, as he feared it might be a bogus message from a German cruiser, but I was able to reassure him that such, was not the case, as I could recognise the touch of the wireless man on the Ruahine, who had spent a good deal of his time ashore with us. Still Mr. Aiken said the Wahine meant £150,000 to the Union Company —could we give him any guarantee? Finally the Wahine got away from Wellington at a few minutes before 8 a.m. She did 20 knots an hour down the harbour, 22 knots through the Heads, and then 24 knots until ehe picked up the Ruahine at 4.20 p.m. The passengers were at once transferred to th© Wahine, which stood by the Ruahine as she returned to Wellington at a speed of seven knots per hour, arriving at 1.30 in the morning. It appeared that one of the doors used in loading frozen meat had become jammed in closing, and the water had poured in ever sine© she left port."