Plans for $30,000 wahine memorial

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33626, 30 August 1974, Page 13

Plans for $30,000 wahine memorial

‘Ac’c Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON. Proposals for a $30,000 memorial to the nahine, which foundered in Wellington Harbour with the loss of 51 lives on April 10, 1968, were disclosed on Wednesday by the Wellington City Council.

It involves the erection of; a shell-like building beside' Gibraltar Rock in Breaker : Bay, as well as the develop-! merit of the nearby area into! a picnic area and park. The focal point of the! memorial will be one of the! Wahine’s manoevring pro-; pellors salvaged from the' harbour entrance. This, about 4|ft in diameter, will be mounted be-j neath a skylight formed from translucent material to allow sunlight to penetrate. The building itself will form a pure geometric spiral, said the Mayor of Wellington (Sir Francis Kitts). The! memorial would be a national rather than a Wellington one, and there would be a New ( Zealand-wide appeal for < funds for the project. < Sir Francis said that the " shape of the building would

(represent a seashell thrown lon the beach by the rising jsea. It had been designed to I blend with a seaside site. (Round the outside would be !a series of “portholes” fitted I with “rifle-type sightings.” 'Beside each of the portholes (would be an inscription giving the sequence of events (from the time the Wahine i first crossed Cook Strait until I she finally foundered near Steeple Rock.