Salvager Les Savage wants to raise the Mikhail Lermontov — and then retire

Press, 16 April 1986, Page 21

Salvager Les Savage wants to raise the Mikhail Lermontov — and then retire

By

ANDREW MACALISTER

New Zealand’s salvaging expert, Les Savage, of Christchurch, believes the Mikhail Lermontov can be raised — and he is prepared to do it. With the salvaging experience of over 40 years and 50 boats behind him, Mr Savage believes claims that the sunken liner is not recoverable are wrong. Tenders have not yet been called for the salvage of the Russian cruise liner, which sank in the Marlborough Sounds in February, but when they are he may submit one.

He has done a lot of calculations and talked with two Christchurch firms about supplying equipment for the operation and believes he could do the job for between $5 million and $6 million.

Having just finished work on his latest “patient,” the 14-metre yacht, Masada, formerly the Karelia, which broke its moorings and sank in Purau Bay in 1984, Mr Savage says the Mikhail Lermontov would be a “mighty challenge.” “If the money was made available, I would get it up.” He hopes finance could be provided by the Russian embassy or through an insurance company. “All I have is the enthusiasm,” he adds.

If the Marlborough Harbour Board wants the wreck to be removed from its resting place in Port Gore, it may have to be dismantled piece by piece because people are saying the liner is not salvageable, he says. “That would take years.”

At this stage it appeared only overseas firms would be interested or considered capable of doing the job. While not wishing to give away many details of his plans, Mr Savage says that with the purchase of a small ship capable of being used as an offshore base next to the wreck, and with a team of divers, he could have the ship floating in 18 months. The cruise liner is in ideal conditions, because it is not in deep water and is lying on its side. It would make repairs easy. Mr Savage dismisses the inevitable sceptics to his plan, saying whenever he has salvaged boats it has been when people have been saying he is wasting his time or it is impossible. “If people say it is impossible to do then I will be inspired to do it.”

‘Seem to have the knack’

His life in salvaging wrecks is a record of doing things which other people thought were impractical. “I just seem to have the knack of knowing what to do to bring them up.” However, boats are just one aspect of Mr Savage’s skills. He has restored hundreds of cars

and in his full-time job as a building contractor, he specialises in restoring and repairing damaged houses. In 1943, at the age of 14, while an apprentice bricklayer, he salvaged his first yacht. He remembers it being a 16-footer that was on the rocks in Charteris Bay. And after wrapping canvas across its holed bottom, he got friends of his father to tow the yacht across the harbour. Once ashore, he took it to his home in New Brighton where he worked on it after work and at week-ends, in between doing extra bricklaying to pay for the repairs. After a while he exchanged it for a damaged 18-foot yacht which he also restored. From there it was a 21-foot yacht and then a larger yacht until he was salvaging and repairing large power-boats and launches for himself.

After a spell in the navy, he returned to Christchurch and bought a 30-foot lifeboat which had sunk on the Avon River. Even in the navy his compulsion to work came through and he found himself salvaging a couple of yachts from Auckland waters to repair in his “spare time.” Back in Christchurch, the boats kept on coming and going, including the Australisian champion powerboat, Mandrake, and

the coast guard vessel, Mandalay. His salvages ranged from boats abandoned after foundering, to boats left derelict on their moorings, to fire-damaged vessels. He used to range throughout the South Island to look at wrecks, but most came from around Christchurch and the Marlborough Sounds.

Working as a building contractor during the day, he applied his skills to houses that were damaged by floods or in need of restoration. Over the years, Mr Savage said he has probably “done” as many houses as boats.

‘Don’t need to sleep or rest’

He has restored hundreds of cars also, culminating in 1981 when he began Christchurch’s well-known fleet of Armstrong Siddeley wedding cars. After restoring one of the cars, he applied for a licence to run it as a wedding car and soon had a fleet of five immaculate cars, with parts scavenged from other Siddelays throughout the country. In 1984, he left that business to salvage his present yacht, Masada, which was wrecked at Purau Bay in a north-easterly gale before it had even been for a sail.

The yacht was declared a write-off, but with a tender of $5200 Mr Savage again proved the experts wrong. The yacht’s estimated value is now $140,000. Masada is moored in Lyttelton and shows no traces of its unfortunate beginnings. He admits, with such a list of achievements, that he is a compulsive worker. "I just have a compulsion to finish things. I don’t seem to need to sleep or rest.”

His working days usually begin early and will continue on until about midnight when working on a project. While trying to raise the Masada he worked around the clock for two weeks until the yacht was hauled out of the water.

He admits he now likes to restore anything which has historic value.

“Anything that is beautiful, lovely, written off, I’ll restore. It’s a challenge, whether it’s a car or a boat. I get a hell of a lot of satisfaction from fixing them and knowing they still go.” As for the Mikhail Lermontov, he sees it as his “final fling” before possibly retiring to the Marlborough Sounds on Masada. The other enticement is that people are saying it is impossible to salvage, a point he refuses to believe. “Most people would say I’m just being mad.”

Mad or not, he does seem to get results.