MAUNGANUI GOES TO BREAKERS

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28251, 12 April 1957, Page 15

MAUNGANUI GOES TO BREAKERS

46-Year-Old Liner Sold

Another famous veteran of the New Zealand trade has passed to the, shipbreakers after 46 years of faithful service. She is the Greek liner Cyrenia, well-known for 36 years as the Maunganui of Union Steam Ship Company’s fleet.

The old ship has been sold to Italian breakers at Genoa for £24 a ton gross, representing a total price of just more than £105,000 —which is probably not a great deal less than the cost to build. As the Maunganui she was built in 1911 by the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Co. at Glasgow and was brought out to New Zealand by the late Captain L. C. H. Worrall who commanded her for many years until his retirement. She was a twin-screw passenger steamer of 7527 tons gross register.

1914 Main Body

The Maunganui was the flagship of the convoy of 10 ships that left Wellington on October 16, 1914, with the Main Body of the First New Zealand Expeditionary Force. In company with the Union Company’s Tahiti she sailed on six trooping voyages to Egypt and three to England, and also brought several returning drafts of troops back to New Zealand. Both ships also carried Amercian troops across the Atlantic in 1917-18.

After the war the Maunganui returned to the intercolonial trade and made a number of voyages in the trans-Pacific passenger service to San Francisco and Vancouver.

She was 30 years old when she was taken over in 1941 by the New Zealand Government and converted into a hospital ship. For the most part the Maunganui was employed on voyages between New Zealand and Suez. In June, 1942 the Maunganui rescued 39 survivors of a Panamanian steamer which had been sunk by a German U-boat off the east cost of Africa. A few months later she rendered aid to the Dutch tanker Ondina, which had suffered heavy casualties in a gallant fight against two Japanese raiders. She also rescued three German boys who had escaped in a small boat from internment in Portuguese Goa on the west coast of India. Pacific Fleet In May, 1945, the Maunganui joined the Fleet Train, British Pacific Fleet, and was stationed in Leyte Gulf, Philippine Islands. After the surrender of Japan, in August 1945, she was sent to Hong Kong and Keelung, in Formosa, to evacuate prisoners of war from Japanese camps to New Zealand.

The last missidn of the Maunganui on Government service was to transport the New Zealand contingent of service men and women to England for the official Victory celebrations in London. She returned to New Zealand in August, 1946, and was paid off. Some months later the old ship was sold to the Hellenic Mediterranean Lines Co. Ltd., of Athens, who had her completely refitted as a three-class passenger ship. As the Cyrenia she has made a number of voyages during the last 10 years between the Mediterranean and Australia.