Maori sold to Hong Kong

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33434, 16 January 1974, Page 1

Maori sold to Hong Kong

(.Veto Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, January 15.

The Union Steam Ship Company’s former inter-island ferry Maori has been sold, for an undisclosed price, to an Asian company.

The Union company said that Wiltopps (Asia), Ltd. of Hong Kong, proposed to use the 7340-ton Maori to trade out of Hong Kong.

The Maori will be towed to Hong Kong soon by the 377ton tug Mariner, which has left Manila for Wellington, where the Maori is laid up. The Wellington manager of the Union company (Mr P. E. Maxwell) declined this evening to give details of the sale. A representative of Wiltopps would do this in Wellington tomorrow, he said.

The Maori has been laidup in Wellington since March, 1972, when the new Rangatira replaced her on the Wellington-Lyttelton ferry service.

The Maori was launched from the Vickers Walker yard at Newcastle upon Tyne on November 27, 1952, by Princess Margaret — and in 1965 was sailed to Hong Kong, where she was converted from a lift-on lift-off ship to a roll-on roll-off vessel.

During her 20 years of service, the Maori — the third Union company ship to bear the name — steamed about 1,082,000 miles and carried 1,239,772 passengers. Last year, the Swiss-based Youth with a Mission group tried to buy the Maori for $480,000 for a floating mission station, but had to forfeit its $48,000 deposit when it could not raise the balance of the purchase price.