SURPRISED WHALE

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 146, 18 December 1933, Page 5

SURPRISED WHALE

LAUNCH ON BLOW-HOLE

LAUNCHMAN'S UPS AND DOWNS

There was an old identity, Captain Jackson Barry, who toured New Zealand as a lecturer in the nineties, a man of wide colonial experience, who was credited with having ridden on the back of a whale. It was a New Zealand joke of the eighties and nineties, and the aged lecturer made it one of his own platform jokes. But, according to his own evidence and that of eve-witnesses, as recorded in the Sydney Press, Mr. Norman Scott, of Harbour Street, Cronulla, Sydney, rode ou the back of a whale on DecemIt is said that the whale, coming up to blow, lifted Mr. Scott's 16 feet launch, and carried it for 20 or 30 feet. But the launch happened to be over the whale's blowing apparatus, so the whale, instead of blowing, went down again, leaving launch and man on top, half-swamped. The whale might have blown ten or twelve gallons of water, and might then have thumped the water wth its tail, as whales' are said to do after blowing; but it did neither, and so the launch escaped the thump that Mr. Scott expected. There were other boats fishing. Mr. Scott was alone in his. It drifted as he fished. "I heard a cry from one of my mates," said Mr. Scott. "Tho next moment the launch tilted. I saw the whale's head appear; and tho launch was lifted into the air. The whale was still coining up; the launch was balanced. It tilted, and all my ropes and fishing gear spilled into the middle of the boat. As the whale continued to break water I was carried along with it for 20 or £10 feet, poised four or five feet above the.surf ace. The launch by this time was tilted over at a sharp angle. Then it started to slip down the whale's side.

•' The gunwale touched the water first, and the launch half filled. I remember thinking, 'If the whale blows and hits the -water with its tail it will smash the launch to pieces.' When I saw the whale properly, I realised that it was 40. to 50 feet long. As it started to dive .under the water again it's tail started to move. I thought it would strike the water with the terrific blow a whale usually gives when it sinks after blowing. Fortunately, it sank almost im-. mediately." Fishermen near Cronulla, Mr. Scott said, lived in almost constant peril from whales, especially in winter time. Many men had had narrow escapes from whales coming up to blow. The whales send out 10 or 12 _ gallons of water, and, as they dive again, they strike the water a tremendous blow with their tails. Apparently, Mr. Scott's launch rested almost exactly over the blow-hole of the whale aud prevented it blowing. A few months ago Mr. Scott, with a companion in another launch, was fishing near Gario Beach. The boats were anchored about 25 feet apart, and a whale dashed between them.

"I thought that experience was bad enough," said Mr. Scott. "I did not think that I would be given a rido on a whale's back."

Though the launch was half filled and lost its rudder, he was able to reach shore.