Cruise ship aground in Antarctica: 3 vessels on way to rescue

Press, 26 December 1979, Page 1

Cruise ship aground in Antarctica: 3 vessels on way to rescue

With a flooded engine room and a fivedegree list, the cruise ship Lindblad Explorer was hard aground 70km off the Antarctic Peninsula late last evening.

Three foreign ships were sailing through heavy seas to the aid of the stricken vessel, but the first was not expected to reach her until mid-morning today. Messages relayed from McMurdo Station to the United States Navy Antarctic Support Force headquarters in Christchurch put the total number on board the Lindblad Explorer at 150, although the vessel usually sails with about 150 passengers alone. The search and rescue effort is being co-ordinated from McMurdo Station. The nearest of the three ships aC ed to heln. ths Chilean Piloto Pardo was believed to be less than 12 sailing hours from the Lindblad Explorer late last evening. Reports said weather in the area was bad, with low cloud, fog, rain, and moderate to heavy seas. A spokesman for the Antarctic Support Force.

Senior Chief B. R. Kinder, said last evening that McMurdo Station had only Cl 30 Hercules aircraft, which would be of little use in a . a rescue. McMurdo Station was also about 960 km away from the stranded vessel. “Assistance by ship is the only way,” said Mr Kinder. Details were still sketchy as the rescue operation gathered momentum but it was believed that the ship was not in immediate danger and that the passengers would not have to be taken off. Mr Kinder said he believed the Piloto Pardo would try to tow the Lindblad Explorer free while, the pumps worked to ciear the flooded engine room. A Soviet freighter, the Gueizer, working in the Punta Arenas area has also been asked by the United States Coastguard \

to help. The third vessel, the Norwegian research ship Polarsirkel, has been alerted and will soon enter the area. Mr Kinder said the Lindblad Explorer, with a displacement of about 2300 tons and 80m long, had its own doctor and medical facilities and was self-sufficient in all matters of navigation, supply, and support. It was not known last evening whether the vessel had run aground on ice or rock. “There was no mention of ice in the radio messages so we might presume she is on rocks,” said Mr Kinder. The Lindblad Explorer is on one of her several seasonal cruises from South America to the Antarctic Peninsula carrying mainly American passengers. She has run aground 40 miles off the United States’ Palmer Station on Anvers Island, about 625 miles from Cape Horn. Anvers Island is on the west side of the Antarctic Peninsula. The Lindblad Explorer has plied Antarctic waters for the last 10 years. Chartered vessels ran a similar service before that. One of these, the Magga Dan, a mucn smaller ship, ran aground in 1968 off Hut Point, near McMurdo Sound, and had to be dragged off by American icebreakers. The Lindblad Explorer was built in Finland in 1969 especially for Antarctic cruising. Her passengers last season paid an all-up fare of from $6670 to $10,665 for one of the longer trips of about five weeks. She was due in Lyttelton on one of these voyages late in February. The Lindblad Explorer makes two or three trips to the Antarctic Peninsula every season between October and May. Naturalists and lecturers on board give instruction in Antarctic natural history, show films, and take studv groups on to the ice in rubber landing craft.