Extra Miles For Comfort In Gale

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30677, 17 February 1965, Page 1

Extra Miles For Comfort In Gale

(From Our Own Reporter) TIMARU, February 16. A tribute to the seamanship of the master of the cruise ship, Oriental Queen, was paid today by Mr G. L. Barker, a passenger on the ship, which arrived off the Port of Timaru last evening and tied up this morning.

The ship was unable to enter Milford Sound because of a south-west gale, Mr Barker said. Captain M. Kamaya could have saved himself 200 miles steaming but, rather than expose the ship and passengers to four hours’ beam seas in 60 to 80 mile an hour gales, he took the Oriental Queen south of Stewart Island in a gradual curve. The trip was comparatively

smooth yesterday, although the ship was pitching heavily at times, and taking spray right over the bow. The first persons off the ship when she berthed at Timaru were two passengers injured while the ship was rolling in the high seas. Mrs C. B. Bannon, an Australian, suffered lacerations and severe cuts to the face and head when a chair in which she was sitting careered into a pillar. Mrs C. C. James, of Hamilton, suffered a broken leg. Both were taken to the Timaru Hospital for treatment.

Captain Kamaya said the Oriental Queen was scheduled to make another South Island cruise next February. The itinerary would be the same as for the present cruise. The Oriental Queen was originally the armed Australian merchant cruiser Kanimbla, and lifeboat instructions still refer to the Kanimbla, and most of the pictures are still the same. The vessel, built in 1936, has a gross tonnage of 11,004 and she is 484 ft in length. She was sold to her present owners in 1961, since when she has been continuouslyemployed as a cruise ship.