Students Believed Drowned

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31315, 10 March 1967, Page 1

Students Believed Drowned

Two of a party of four theological students from the Holy Name Seminary, Riccarton, were swept out to sea when the party was trapped for 11 hours on rocks between the sea and the 300 ft Whitewash Head at Scarborough last evening.

The sea was poundirig the rocks and cliff when two of the Sumner lifeboat crew rescued two of the students about midnight. The four men, aged 19 and 20, became trapped about 1 p.m. yesterday.

The students’ names are:

Phillip Gibbs, of Hutt; Michael Connor, of Auckland; John Van Gessel, of Waiuku; and David Horgan, of Christchurch. The police early today said that they could not release the names of the two students missing, believed drowned. The two men and, a police party clambered round the rocks at the foot of the cliff in pitch darkness after rough and low water had prevented a rescue attempt by the Sumner lifeboat.

Police at the top of the 300 ft cliff had also been blocked in any rescue by darkness, the bulging overhang of the cliff, and its crumbling, volcanic rock.

One of the rescue party said that all four students had been swept off the rocks into the sea during the 11 hours they were trapped. One student had been swept into the sea by the

waves pounding the rocks about 1.30 p.m. Later, the remaining three students were swept into the sea. It was about two hours later. Two of them managed to clamber back on to the rocks, suffering gashes to their faces and arms. The two turned to see the third student floating out to sea, face down. The rescue party had to clamber round the rocks, with the incoming tide pounding them fiercely, in pitch darkness. They held on to the crumbling rocks with one band, torches in the other. The two rescued students were taken to hospital short- 1 ly after midnight. They were shocked, and had superficial wounds. The Sumner lifeboat was called but at 9.15 p.m., put up flares, and lo- 1 rated the students, but was 1 unable to help because of the ' danger from the sea surging ' on the rocks. Police rigged searchlights at the top of the- cliff and ( sent for alpine rescue gear. s It was Jow tide at 10 p.m., j and the students were just t above the high-water mark. The cliff above the ledge 1 where the four men are 1

stranded bulges outwards, and the lifeboat radio operator (Mr W. J. Baguley) informed the police that for any attempt to rescue the climbers from the top, expert climbers and face alpine equipment would be needed. Mr Baguley was attempting to speak to the stranded men with a loud-hailer with the boat anchored about 100 yards , off Whitewash Head.

s The roar of the surf made a it impossible for him to hear e their answers, 9 The lifeboat eould not put back into Scarborough be--5 cause there was insufficient J water—the tide was dead low at 10 p.m. . The lifeboat, after riding at anchor off the cliff for more ; than an hour, set out for Lyt- , telton about 11.20 p.m. , In the meantime, Messrs J. i Pickering and B. Kerr, of the ' lifeboat crew, had set off on . foot to try to reach the stud- . ents by clambering round the i rocks at the foot of the cliffs. Reached At 11.30 p.m., the two men and the policemen with them learned from the two stranded students that the other two had been swept out to sea. The information was radioed back to the police. Attempts were made to get the lifeboat back on the scene, but her radio had broken down as she went up Lyttelton Harbour. It was thought, at first, that the students who bad been swept off might still be swimming or have clambered up on rocks farthur round the cliffs, but when the rescuers reached the two stranded students, they learned that the other two had been swept off . the rocks more than seven hours earlier. The secretary of the Sumner Lifeboat Institution (Mr W. J. Baguley), who was operating the radio on the lifeboat, said that the fastitution had been asking the City Council to extend the lifeboat launching ramp, or dredge the boat harbour, for more than two years. “If we had been able to put back into Scarborough, we could have had the lifeboat out on the scene again within minutes after it was known that two students had been swept out to sea,” Mr Baguley said.