Injured Man Cut Free By Mates
The desperate efforts of six sailors to free a trapped comrade with hacksaws as their ship was sinking on Monday night were described by two of Voyager’s Leading Mechanics (Engineering)—Tom Scarsi, aged 23, of Perth, and Rod Layfield, aged 22, of Cronulla.
“About 40 men were in the aft mess when the crash came,” said Layfield. ‘ “The lights went out and water started to pour in. “We all got out of the mess and made our way topside. There was no panic. “Then I saw my mate,
Leading Sick-Berth Attendant, Johnny Wilson, pinned under a twisted and bent steel torpedo catwalk. “He was in a bad way.
“I got a hacksaw and called for help. “Tom Scarsi turned up with one bloke and then four more fellows i came along. “We. hacked away like mad. . . It was dark and we didn’t know when the ship would go down. “I think it was about 10 minutes with all of us going flat out, but it seemed like hours . before we could cut away pieces of the catwalk.
“Then about 40 of us heaved together and managed to move the catwalk and free Johnny.” Wilson was picked up by a minesweeper. He now is in the naval hospital at H.M.A.S. Albatross, Nowra:
Permanent link to this item
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19640213.2.126
Bibliographic details
Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30364, 13 February 1964, Page 13
Word Count
216Injured Man Cut Free By Mates Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30364, 13 February 1964, Page 13
Using This Item
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Press. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 New Zealand licence. This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.
Acknowledgements
This newspaper was digitised in partnership with Christchurch City Libraries.
Log in