IN HURRICANE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 96, 26 April 1933, Page 7

IN HURRICANE .

SEVERELY BATTERED. Steamer's Battle With Storm After Leaving Bluff. ARRIVES TWO DAYS LATE. (United P.A.—Electric Telegraph—Copyright) (Received 11 a.m.) MELBOURNE, this day. The Union Company's cargo steamer Wainui (684 tons) arrived at Victoria docks two days late on her voyage from the Bluff, having been severely battered in a hurricane. The officers told of a battle against a storm which the vessel ran into soon after it cleared the Bluff and which lasted until they were almost in sight of the Victorian coast. "A 70-mile-an-hour gale and seas that blotted out the horizon, made us dance about like a cork, and at times threatened to overwhelm us," said one officer. "At two on Saturday afternoon a sea crashed over the starboard side, lifted the lifeboat off its chocks and hurled it along the deck, and, breaking the skylight, poured down into the engine-room. The engineers and greasers on watch thought the ship was foundering. "A few. minutes later a seaman at great risk rescued the starboard lifeboat. The port lifeboat suffered a similar fate and had to be lashed. The Wainui then hove-to for five hours. Sailors were forced to keep continuous watch on six prize horses and a bull, as they were tossed about and had difficulty in keeping their feet'. However, they were not seriously hurt." The Wainui's master described the trip as the worst- crossing of the Tasman that he had ever known. A Sydney message states that gale conditions continue along the New South Wales, coast with very rough' seas.