SWEPT OFF SHIP

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 33, 9 February 1943, Page 2

SWEPT OFF SHIP

FIVE MEN IN LAUNCH ORDEAL IN MID-PACIFIC (O.C. SYDNEY, Feb. 5. A letter received in Sydney tells of the remarkable experience of five men who recently were trapped beneath a launch, which landed in the water upside down after it had been swept off a ship's deck in midPacific. The letter tells how the five men were sleeping in the launch with the hatch closed because it was raining. Big seas were running. One wave which struck the ship threw the vessel so far over that the launch was wrenched from its fastenings and went over the side. When the launch hit the water upside down .the men were thrown about and badly bruised. They searched desperately for a way out and got the hatch open. They had decided to dive through the hatch and fight their way to the surface because the launch was rapidly sinking when a wave struck them and turned the launch right side up. They climbed out of the hatch and clung to the slippery top and sides of the launch, badly buffeted by the seas which swept over them. As the launch was sinking they decided to launch a dinghy which was lashed to the top, but no sooner was it put in the water than it was washed away. They dived off the launch and swam to the dinghy, two of the stronger swimmers supporting another man who was suffering from influenza. The ship, which had turned round, circled the area for two hours before finding the men. The captain was on the point of giving them up as lost when the dinghy was sighted, and they were taken aboard.