ORDEAL ON A LUGGER

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23315, 29 April 1941, Page 7

ORDEAL ON A LUGGER

SIX DAYS WITHOUT FOOD MISHAPS ON PLEASURE CRUISE (P.0.0.C.) SYDNEY, April 24. After heavy seas had washed their stores overboard, nine men on the Darwin lugger Ellen R, fought storms for six days with nothing to eat and nothing to drink but brackish water, and one cup of tea. With six white men and three aborigines on boax - d the Ellen R. was on a pleasure cruise from Darwin to Melville Island. The first night out a violent storm struck the ship near Cape Don. Through the night the men worked the pumps continuously, but the heavy seas kept stalling the engine. For hours, with the engine not working, the Ellen R. drifted in fierce seas. In the morning she struggled into an inlet on the mainland and took shelter.

When the storm had gone down the men sailed again for Melville Island. But soon a second storm struck them, and they were blown 80 miles off their course into the Timor Sea. When finally they reached Melville Island they were on -the side opposite to which they had been making. There was no food to be got, and they had only one gallon of water. They headed for Melville Island anchorage in the hope that a pearling lugger would be sheltering there, but th.ere was none. Exhausted by hunger and thirst, they decided to sail back to Darwin. Eighty miles from Darwin they were sighted by an aeroplane which had been searching for them. The white men paid a tribute to the seamanship and faithfulness of the aborigines.