Many passengers still can’t quite believe it

Press, 18 February 1986, Page 4

Many passengers still can’t quite believe it

By

TESSA WARD

The reality of such a sudden end to their relaxing cruise aboard the Mikhail Lermontov does not seem really to have dawned on many of the passengers yet. “I think many of us can’t believe what happened to us and are still in a dream,” Mrs Marjorie Fernandez, of Queensland, said yesterday at Christchurch Airport before boarding a flight for Sydney.

Some 383 tourists left Christchurch for Australia yesterday. Her friend, Mr John Carnegie, of Sydney, said that the shock was likely to have its full impact on passengers within the next few days.

“We know we were awfully lucky and yet we are bemoaning the loss of silly little things like our nail clippers and toothbrushes,” he said.

When the liner hit a rock near Cape Jackson about 6 p.m. on Sunday, Mr Carnegie was playing cards and Mrs Fernandez was stepping out of a shower.

“I felt the bump and took no notice until I heard someone yell, ‘abandon ship’,” Mrs Fernandez said. “I was told to grab my lifejacket and handbag and ran out into the corridor to look for John.” In the meantime, Mr Carnegie was searching frantically for Mrs Fernandez.

"I was running along the passageway looking everywhere for her when a fireproof door slammed

in my face, stopping me in my tracks, and I nearly went off my head,” he said. “Eventually I heard her shouting ‘John’ and the sight of her safely with me lifted a great load off my mind.

“We became worried when we couldn’t return to our cabins but we knew that the crew were doing the best they could to cope calmly with the situation.”

Mr Jim Mitchell, aged 83, of near Maryborough, Queensland, said the crew adopted effective ways of keeping the passengers as calm as possible. “Considering that there were people as old as me and even older, it was just as well,” he said. “Some of the crew simply told the passengers to follow them from one deck to another which kept them walking, and therefore occupied, rather than beginning to think of the worst that could happen.

“My luggage was not insured because I thought that nothing like this would happen to such a big beautiful ship.” Another passenger from Sydney, Lieutenant John Muncey, said that the

crew’s announcement, shortly after the ship hit the rock, that dinner would be served half an hour late, served to calm the passengers. “Later they announced that although the ship bad been damaged there was no cause for immediate alarm,” he said. “The transfer of more elderly passengers to the waiting tanker nearby got under way quickly and calmly.” Mr Muncey, who spent 18 years in the Royal Navy and the merchant service, said that he knew the ship was in difficulty as soon as she hit the rock.

“It is possible that there was an error of judgment which caused the collision. Almost immediately the ship listed to one side and began taking on water.

“She was obviously going to keel over and I soon knew that she was going to sink. Unfortunately the engines cut out before the ship could be firmly beached in Port Gore.”

The Mikhail Lermontov glided gently on to the beach and stayed there for a crucial two hours

allowing most of the passengers to be safely offloaded, Lieutenant Muncey said. "Passengers would have been in much more difficulty if they were still on board when the vessel began to drift off the beach and rapidly take in water. I was surpised that the crew did not try to anchor the vessel to the beach.”

A young couple from Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, Mr and Mrs Stuart and Janine McGowan, saw the drama as “a different kind of ending to our honeymoon.” Mr McGowan, who works for his state’s emergency services, said he helped to lift and accompany many elderly passengers from the decks into waiting liferafts. “We were among the last passengers to leave the ship and because the deck was keeling over dangerously, we had to cut our raft away from the ship just before she went under. Some of the last crew on board had to dive off the decks, swim towards empty liferafts,; and beat a hasty retreat from the massive liner.”