Lucky Rescue: Two Seamen Who Jumped Off Ship

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 August 1949, Page 4

Lucky Rescue: Two Seamen Who Jumped Off Ship

WELLINGTON, This Day (P.A.).— Two Norwegian seamen, Tom Wesenberg and Andersen Larsen, fell from the tanker Herbrand as she was passing through Wellington ■ Heads last night. They were both rescued, but by sheer good fortune. According to reports last night, there was no indication that the ship had . even missed the two members of its complement. It is also reported that Wesenberg told his rescuers that they deliberately jumped off the ship as they wanted to remain in New Zealand. The Herbrand left Miramar wharf at 4 p.m. yesterday, but hove-to in the stream because of engine trouble. She sailed for Sourabaya and Ababan about 7.30 p.m. Seen From The Hinemoa Captain R. E. Suckling, a Wellington harbour pilot, was aboard the pilot launch Uta when she picked up the two men abreast of Barrett’s Reef. He said later he was about to transfer from the Herbrand, which he had piloted out of the harbour, to the launch when the Hinemoa, on her way "to Lyttelton and about to overtake the Herbrand, signalled the launch that a man was in the water. The Hinemoa dropped a lifebuoy, with a light attached, overboard and stopped. , „ x . With the aid of a lamp, Captain Suckling made a search of the water about the buoy and found two men, a couple of hundred feet apart, near it The men had probably been 20 minutes in the cold water and were suffering from exposure to such an extent that they were unable to say what ship they belonged to or how long they had been in the water. Taken To Hospital The Uta sent a radio message ashore and went straight to the Seatoun wharf from which an ambulance took the two men to the Wellington Hospital. Captain Suckling said the men, whom he immediately presumed were from the Herbrand, were lucky to be seen by the Hinemoa and to be picked up. Although they were in the track of shipping, the night was very dark. Yesterday morning, Wesenberg, whose age was given as 32, and another member of the crew, Ole Balken, appeared, before Mr Herd, S.M., on charges of absenting 'themselves from the Herbrand. After hearing evidence from the ship’s captain, through an interpreter, the Magistrate dismissed the charges.