N.Z. MINESWEEPERS

Greymouth Evening Star, 9 September 1941, Page 8

N.Z. MINESWEEPERS

ANOTHER LAUNCHED AUCKLAND, September 9. A fortnight after the launching of the minesweeper Hinau, her sistership Rimu was sent down the slipway to-day, after being christened with a bottle of New Zealand wine by Mrs. Parry, wife of Commodore Parry, Chief of the Naval Staff. Like that of the Hinau, it was a perfect launch, the stout steel and wooden vessel sliding slowly, into the Waitemata, where she was picked up by a tug and towed to the fitting-out basin. A sprig of rata was at the bow,l

and as the ship gathered speed down the greased ways, the New Zealand Ensign, the Union Jack, and the White Ensign were broken . out aboard, and there were cheers from • the large crowd, while the National ; Anthem was played. ' Commodore Parry congratulated all i associated with the construction and . launching of the ship. Referring to . the fact that Auckland had a substantial shipbuilding industry in the . past, he said that although steel had . superseded wood there was no reason why larger ships of war, also commercial vessels when the war was over, could not be built in the DoI minion. Quoting the case of Japan, he

i added that the absence of iron should 1 not be a bar, as there was plenty ? available in Australia. He hoped that t New Zealand firms would take adi vantage of the opportunity.—P.A. ! 1