CAST ON ROCKS

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 15, 17 July 1937, Page 10

CAST ON ROCKS

LAUNCH PARTY'S ESCAPE

A NIGHTMARE JOURNEY

(From "The Post's" Representative.) SYDNEY, July 8.

Three men and three women had remarkable escapes on Sunday night when a launch, the Spurway, following engine trouble, was driven on rocks at South Head by a powerful westerly. Two of- the people, Horace Steam and his wife Thelma, lost consciousness as a result of exposure and had to be carried up the face of the cliff, by the police. Others on board were Harold A. Woods (the owner), Mr. and Mrs. Albert Bowman, and Miss Dorothy Emerson.

The parly had spent the day on a harbour cruise and were making for. the launch's moorings when the engine cut out. The launch was quickly blown across 'the mouth of the harbour to the rocks. The six persons scrambled ashore, but the Steams fell into the water as they did so. Woods decided to stand by the launch in the hope of saving it, and the Steams and Miss Emerson decided to remain on the rocks nearby. Takiri'g the only torch the party possessed, Mr. and Mrs. Bowman set out to try to get assistance.

The first news of the accident was not received until 8.30 p.m. when Mr. and Mrs. Bowman, wet to the skin and nearly exhausted, knocked at the door of Mr. W. Jamieson's house at Watson's Bay. The police hurried to the launch.

Mr. Jamieson said it was almost a miracle that Mr. and Mrs. Bowman were' successful in making their way from the place where the launch went ashore to his home. ■ They had come southward, where the only track in places was a narrow sloping ledge, barely wide enough for a foothold, winding round the cliff face. Below was a drop of ten feet into deep water. A howling gale must have made the journey a nightmare, and it was. almost incredible that two people, one a woman, who did not know the track, could have negotiated it by the feeble light of an electric torch on such a wild night.