THE RANGATIRA MISHAP

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 133, 29 February 1936, Page 8

THE RANGATIRA MISHAP

The essentia] points in the report and recommendations of the Marine Court of Inquiry which investigated the circumstances connected with the mishap to the express steamer Rangatira are the suggestions submitted for the prevention of similar occurrences in the future. That part of the report is really what the public is most concerned about. What happened belongs to the past. It is what may happen again, and therefore should be provided for, that matters. A radio beacon in the vicinity of Wellington Heads would have enabled the Rangatira to fix her position with certainty. The court has accordingly recommended that one should be- provided. Had the mishap occurred a year ago there would no doubt be a radio beacon there now. No more need be said on that point.. It is further recommended that all vessels equipped with directionfinding apparatus should be required to ascertain their positions at least four times at stated intervals on the stretch between Cape Campbell and Wellington Heads. The court admits that this may be overdoing the precautionary measures, but it argues, and most people will agree here, that there would be no excuse for neglecting the rule if it were made applicable to all weathers, good or bad, and at all times, day or night. One of the questions to which the court set itself to find an answer was whether the failure to get a bearing from Tinakori Wireless Station when well across Cook Strait en route to Wellington was the neglect of a necessary or desirable precaution. It considered that, having regard to all the circumstances, there was no neglect. The court’s recommendation under this head amounts to an additional precaution, which, with a radio-beacon service, should eliminate the dangers of navigation in Cook Strait, jvith its uncertain tides, in all weathers. u