N.Z. Ship Rescues Japanese Crew

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32219, 11 February 1970, Page 1

N.Z. Ship Rescues Japanese Crew

(N Z P A.-Reuter—Copyright) TOKYO, February 10. The New Zealand freighter Aotearoa, owned by New Zealand Seatrans, Ltd, today picked up 22 members of the crew of a Japanese iron ore carrier as it sank in a gale off Japan. The captain and four other crew mem* bers are still missing.

The Aotearoa went to the rescue last night when the 34,000-ton California Maru was foundering 250 miles off Cape Nojima, on Japan’s east coast, and picked up the 22 crew shortly before their ship sank. This morning the 4500-ton Aotearoa was heading for Yokohama with the rescued men aboard.

The 6843-ton Japanese vessel Ecuador Maru! picked up two survivorsj ion a life-raft this after-! [noon about 24 miles! jfrom the scene of the i sinking. Survivors praised the mas-1

ter of the California Maru, Captain Hiroshi Sumimura, [aged 44, for his bravery, they said he had kept them aboard the sinking vessel in the 44knot wind, until rescue was near, rather than let them jump into the cold, rough sea. “It was a long wait until we

saw an approaching ship’s light,” one man said. The crew left the sinking ship on liferafts put out by the Aotearoa. But after seeing the men safely on to the liferafts the captain refused to abandon ship. Smiled, Waved “He smiled and waved his ihands to us before the ship sank," survivors said. The Maritime Safety Agency in Tokyo said that the California Maru sank at 6.54 a.m. local time after one of its port ballast tanks broke The Japanese vessel, carrying 60,000 tons of oil, was heading for Wakayama, west!ern Japan, from Los Angeles. Japanese Transport Ministry officials said they were shocked at the disaster, coming after three other sinkings in the same area in the last 13 months. Other Losses On January 5, 1969, 31 crew died when the 54,271-ton Japanese ore carrier Bolivar Maru broke in two. The 18,260-ton Liberian; tanker Sofia P went down in' similar circumstances on! January 6 this year, losing! seven crew. Only three days ago the 15.977-ton Liberian freighter! [Antonias Demandes sank! [with nine crew dead or missing. Officials said the investigations were still in progress; on the Bolivia Maru disaster) as the carrier was a new! type incorporating different 1 design techniques. But the California Maru, built in June. 1965, was an older type which had been declared completely safe. The California Maru last night radioed it had suffered bow damage and was leaking. The chairman of New Zealand Seatrans, Ltd (Mr R. A. [Owens, of Tauranga) said in a telephone conversation with the Press Association this afternoon that the rescue in heavy seas off Japan was “an amazing feat.” ing feat.” The company’s vessel is registered in Tauranga and sailed from Auckland on January 24 for Otara, in; Northern Japan, with a cargo of frozen meat. “We are proud of the ship and very proud of the crew,” said Mr Owens. “From my own experience, performing a rescue in those conditions would have been very difficult,” said Mr Owens, who is himself a master mariner. Fully Laden “We only have the brief details of the rescue ourselves at the moment but I have been informed that she was still fully laden, which would make the operation even more difficult. “It is not easy to take men from the water or from rafts or boats and if they were rescued from the ship itself by the Aotearoa it would have been absolutely amazing,” said Mr Owens. He said he believed that the conditions were similar to those experienced when the Maranui went down in a gale off the Coromandel Peninsula on June 13, 1968.