Keeler Wrecked In Eventful Auckland Race

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 March 1948, Page 2

Keeler Wrecked In Eventful Auckland Race

(P.A.) AUCKLAND, This Day. The well-known Auckland 25ft keeler, Nada, was wrecked on a rock off Coromandel coast late on Saturday night in a south-easterly gale, which sprang up to make the 100mile race of the Royal Akarana Yacht Club for the Balokovic Cup the most eventful and strenuous yet held.

The Nada, with her owner-skipper, F. Norris, and R. Norgrove, R. Shaw, N. trills and S. Melling aboard, was passing between the Cow and Calf Islands in stormy conditions when she was holed by a rock on a reef from which the' keeler was not able to move.

The crew had to remain below to avoid being swept overboard.

When the tide receded' the men crawled over the rocks to the shore and found a track up the 60ft cliff to a navigation light. Later they hauled the yacht’s engine up the cliff with ropes. Everything moveable was stored in the nagivation light’s concrete tower.

The exhausted men huddled under a shelter built with sails and spars until they were taken off well after daylight by the yacht Rambler, another entrant in the race.

There is some hope of floating the Nada off with oil drums today. Another entrant, the Tainui, was dismasted in the storm.

Only eight of the 17 entrants finished the course. The race was won by Rawhiti.