BOAT CAPSIZES

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 129, 2 June 1936, Page 14

BOAT CAPSIZES

EVANS BAY RESCUE A narrow escape from drowning was experienced yesterday morning by two boys, aged about 15 and 10 respectively, when the home-made boat in which they had gone out into the middle of Evans Bay capsized and sank. Another fine rescue was brought off by Mr. C. Headland, of 450 Evans Bay Road, owner of the auxiliary yawl Viking.

The lads left the shore in a flimsy craft consisting of two sheets of corrugated iron, and at first cruised about in the calm water at the southern end of the bay. Soon the fresh southerly carried them out into the middle of the bay, where their boat quickly filled and capsized. Mr. Headland, who saw their plight from Evans Bay Road, launched the Viking's dinghy, a ninefoot craft, and pulled out to the scene of the capsize. At first he could only find one boy swimming, but he soon encountered the other, clinging to the upturned boat, which was held up for a short time by the air trapped beneath it. The boys were taken home, on reaching the shore, by a passing. motorist. Mr. •"Headland is well known as haying many similar rescues to his credit. His last was only a few weeks ago, when he brought in the waterlogged craft in which four small boys had gone adrift. The incidence of these near fatalities seems to fall in the school holidays. It is Mr. Headland's opinion that it is high time that something was done about the number of mishaps in the bay, and offered the suggestion that a double-ended boat of about sixteen feet should be maintained on the foreshore ready for rescue work.