CLIPPER TRAVELLERS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20634, 9 December 1941, Page 2

CLIPPER TRAVELLERS

NEWS OF JAP. ATTACK RECEPTION IN PACIFIC (Per Press Association.) AUCKLAND, this day. "We were told about the outbreak of hostilities between Japan and the United States after we had left Noumea early this morning and the sight of the New Zealand coast was indeed welcome this afternoon,” said Mr. H. Hunter, of Auckland, a director of the Classic Manufacturing Company, on arrival by the Pacific Clipper this afternoon. Mr. Hunter travelled with Mr. O. Rainger, the managing director of Snow Rainger, Limited, of Auckland. In common with other passengers aboard the Clipper, Mr. Hunter and Mr. Rainger agreed that there was an air of tension aboard when it became known that the United States had become involved in war. The commander of the Clipper, Captain Ford, said that in the circumstances he could say little beyond the fact that the news of the new spread of vuirfare had come by wireless and had been communicated to the passengers. Like other travellers by the machine he was anxious to secure the latest reported details. There had been no news of the sudden Japanese attack when the Clipper took off from Noumea early in the morning “I am quite sure that the attack on Honolulu would come as a great surprise,” Mr. Hunter continued. “The general opinion expressed to us while we were there last Friday was that Honolulu was very heavily fortified. In fact, it was referred to by some Americans we met as the ‘Singapore of the North Pacific.’ ” Several travellers expressed surprise that a place so heavily fortified as Honolulu should have been attacked by the Japanese.