TRAWLER, PILOT

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 81, 6 April 1933, Page 13

TRAWLER, PILOT

LOCAL CONNECTION

The fishing trawler Pilot which? ran; aground on the western pier head at Port Ahuriri ori Sunday afternoon, has become a total loss. All that now remains of tho Pilot is the boiler, which is wedged between the sunken piles. A large portion of the deck has been carried^ out to sea, while other wreckage has been washed up on the Westshore beach. The only portion of the vessel to be . salvaged by the owner, Mr. V. Ticone, was the rudder. The Pilot is well known to many Wellingtonians, for she used, to be a harbour tug here. The Union Steam. Ship Company used to engage the Pilot in the passenger service, at Stiahan, McQuarie Harbour,. Tasmania. When the company required a larger vessel than the Pilot for the service the Natone (at present at Wellington) replaced the Pilot, which was brought to Wellington, where she arrived about 1901.' She was used in tho harbour for a number of years, and when the Union Company no longer required a vessel in Tasmania the Natone was transferred to Wellington. The Pilot ran for the U.S.S. Co. for some time after this, and was finally sold to the Wellington. Harbour Ferries Company, which ran her f6r some time. The Pilot was then sold to Mr. V. Picone to be used in fishing out of Napier Harbour. Tho Pilot.was built in Sydney in ~1884, and had a gross tonnage of 34. She was 75 feet in length, 15 feet in breadth, and 6.8 feet in depth.