THUNDERSTORM AT SEA

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 13910, 8 December 1910, Page 7

THUNDERSTORM AT SEA

THE MANUKA'S EXPERIENCES,

(press association TELEGRAM.) WELLINGTON, December 7. To-day's cable messages announce that tho Ulimaroa, while on her passage from Wellington to Sydney, encountered a violent thunderstorm on Sunday night.

The Manuka, which arrived at Wellington this morning from Sydney, experienced the same electrical disturbaiice, which her officers and those passengers who had sufficiently well-de-veloped sea lega to permit of their pacing tho decks, describe as extraordinary. At 6 p.m. on Sunday, after a few hours of torrential rain, the overcast sky became livid green in colour, the horizon being remarkably clear to the north and north-west. Thero was a fresh wind blowing from tho north, and the barometer remained steady at 29.60. In a few moments vivid flashes of sheet lightning burst from N.E. to N.W. and S.W., accompanied by blinding streaks of forked lightning, which flooded the heavens and the sea with a brilliant intermittent glow. Peals of thunder reverberated among the dense clouds. The wind veered to the south, and then returned to its original quarter. Rain fell in torrents. By 8 o'clock on Sun- • day night the lightning wa? incessant, and tho whole atmosphere seemed alive and aglow with electricity. The eoeno from the ship's bridge was one to be remembered. ''From midnight till 2 a.m.," said an officer to a "Post"* representative, "brilliant scintillations ployed all over the sky, producing the most extraordinary spectacular display any of us had., over seen. It was equatorial in its intensity and vividness. Forked designs of tho most fantastic shapes appeared simultaneously from all quarters of the horizon as well as overhead. The play was incessant, as though a whole fleet of warships were throwing their searchlights round tho heavens, whuo the continuous boom and crashes or thunder could well be likened to s* simultaneous broadside. There was . not much sea, but what there was waa following us. One exceptionally vivid flash disclosed the Ulimaroa flilhouttod i against black'cloudbanks to the south % steering in tho opposite direction, and plugfring against a head-- sea.. Th© , forked streaks, which generally resem- " bled branches of trees in design, not only flashed vertically towards the zenith, but were crossed- by equally vivid flashes,.which darted from east to-south-west, and returned immeaiatcaly in the onpositc direction. By sb.m. on Monday the dun cloud banks of the . horizon wero nink tipped by the dawii. : and the lightning gradually ceased wi+h the daylight." . The Manuka rode through this extra- ' * ordinary disturbance without injury.