Eight survive week adrift on rafts

Press, 9 February 1982, Page 5

Eight survive week adrift on rafts

NZPA Port Moresby The five-year-old son of an Australian engineer still missing at sea is among eight survivors of a freightpassenger barge who spent eight days adrift in rafts without water or food, after abandoning the barge during a storm.

According to some of the survivors, Mr Peter Walsh, aged 50. formerly of Sydney, wished his son. Kerry, ‘ good luck" before handing him over the side to the arms of passengers attempting a long swim to land.

Thirteen people, starved and dehydrated, set out on a desperate swim to a deserted island that was just a blur on the horizon.

Only eight reached the sands of Brumer island, off Samarai in the far east of the Papua New Guinea mainland. Kerry Walsh was among them, having been dragged and half-carried the whole distance by adult swimmers.

The story of tragedy at sea, deprivation for eight days on rafts and the almost miraculous survival of eight people, unfolded after the survivors were flown to Port Moresby by a P.N.G. defence force DC3 Dakota at the week-end.

It is not yet known if or where the Sir Carrick went down. But the 14 shipwrecked people, who included the Australian wife of the barge’s captain, Mrs Norma John, drifted more than 400 km east before they sighted land on the horizon. According to the survivors. Mr Peter Walsh said he was too weak to attempt to swim, but asked other survivors to take his son. Kerry was placed on the back of one of the stronger adult male swimmers, who later trans-

ferred him in turn to other swimmers as they slowly made their way to the uninhabited Brumer Island.

Five of the swimmers, apparently including Mr and Mrs John, disappeared from the group. The waters in Milne Bay of the Gulf of Papua are believed to be infested with sharks. Mr Walsh, the Sir Carrick’s engineer, remained on his raft and is still unaccounted for.

Search authorities said that the eight survivors could have eventually faced death bv dehydration on Brumer Island. ’ had not villagers from the mainland decided to visit the island for a fishing expedition.

The fishermen gave the survivors water and food and ferried them to the mainland near Samarai for expert medical attention. Kerry and the seven others were treated in Samarai

Hospital before being flown back to Port Moresby. The 330-tonne. 27-metre coastal passenger-freight barge Sir Carrick set out from Port Moresby eight days previously on a routine voyage of 350 km west to Kikori.

The barge, owned by Lohberger Engineering, of Port Moresby, carried cement, fuel, and 14 passengers and crew.

Two sister vessels of the Sir Carrick also set out on different voyages about the same time, but returned to port after floundering in force 7 to 10 (80-knot) w’inds whipped up by a cyclone developing in ’the Gulf of Papua. It is not yet known if the Sir Carrick's skipper. Captain Ishia John, also attempted to run back to port. In any case, the Sir Carrick began taking water.

A survivor. Mr Hubert Madi. aged 19. said: "The

weather seemed pretty rough when we set out. but I went down to my bunk later in the night to sleep. I slept and then sometime later somebody woke me and said the barge w r as taking water. I jumped up and when I reached the deck the bow of the barge was disappearing rapidly into the sea. "Somebody got the liferaft inflated and everybody was jumping into it. I also jumped into it. It was very dark and the waves were huge."

Mr Madi said the rafts drifted away from the barge.

"We drifted everywhere — the current took us for eight days, without food or vzater. Sometimes it was so hot and other times so cold and windv.

"Everyone knew it was a matter of life or death and. although we were expecting rescue every day. we also expected the worst."