THE RIPPLE

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 9 August 1924, Page 5

THE RIPPLE

DISASTER FEARED. WRECKAGE WASHED ASHORE. BODY OF SEAMAN FOUND. STILL SOME HOPE. (BY TELEGRAPH —PRESS ASSOCIATION.) WELLINGTON, Aug. 8. A telephone message from Flat Point this afternoon stated that a body and a boat had been found by a rabbiter on the beach. The boat bore the name of the Ripple, and the body was that of a seaman. The worst is feared, but no definite news has yet been received. The police are organising a search along the coast-line for any other signs of boats or men. THOSE ON BOARD.

The list of those on board when the vessel sailed from Wellington is as follows:

J. A. Norling (captain), Wellington. S. Nicholson (chief officer), single, Wellington. D. McAlister (second officer), married, Napier. Mr. McAlister holds a master’s ticket, having at various times been in command of vessels of the Richardson Company. He signed on recently as relieving officer. J. B. NeiLson (chief engineer), married, Johnsonville. Mr. Neilson joined the Ripple about a month ago, taking the place of Mr. J. Glover, who died in Wellington on Wednesday. W. J. Mebaii' (second engineer), married. 1(5 Murphy Street, Wellington. R. Gustatt’sen (seaman), single, Napier. Olaf Dybdale (seaman), married. Newtown, Wellington. R. Johansen (seaman), single, Wellington. W. R. Bruce (seaman), single, no address. Robert Williamson (seaman), married, Norway Street, Wellington. Neils Thomasen (seamen), married, Grafton Road, Roseneath, Wellington. John Charles Ofber (fireman), married, Wellington, and formerly a West Coast miner.

Robert Nelson (fireman), single, Wellington. John J.. Way (seaman), married, Wellington) W. O. Squire (ship’s cook), who shipped at Wellington fust before; the Ripple sailed. Taylor (passenger), married, employed as accountant to A. D. Riley and Co., engineering importers, Wellington. P. Lendan (passenger), of whom little is known here. He booked a passage to Napier by ,tlie vessel. A statement was published that Barton junior, of Trentham, was a passenger. This, however, is incorrect. He went to Napier on the previous trip and/ intended returning in the Ripple when she came back this time.

Beyond the fact that a man’s body was washed ashore and the beaches were being searched, Captain Petersen, the representative of the owners, has received no further news, and the search steamers report that thcj 7 have seen nothing. There is a hope that the steamer may be running before the gale, which has probably now abated at sea. It lias been suggested that the derelict boat and the man’s body may mean that an attempt was made to communicate with the shore.

From Cape Palliser to Flat Point the coast-line is low with sandy, shingly beaches and rocky points extending at intervals some distance off the shore, rendering the whole stretch dangerous for navigation close inshore. The first landing is at Riddiford’s station at Tora, forty miles from Cape Palliser. Castlepoint, twenty miles further on, offers some shelter, but this would not be of very much value in the face of the south-west gale which was reported to be raging along the coast about Flat Point yesterday and last night. As stated yestei’day, telephone communication with Cape Palliser was lost after the bare announcement of the Ripple’s peril was got through. Had this connection been maintained it is possible the Mararoa could have been advised by wireless of the derelict steamer’s position so long as the latter remained in sight of the lighthouse.

The trawler Futurist, which is searching, may, if she picks up the Ripple, tow her ,on to Napier. As neither vessel carries wireless, nothing will be known till she reaches port unless she can signal some Sheep station along the coast. The worst of the storm now seems to have passed. Actually its full force was not experienced in the Dominion, the centre being off the coast, and probably it was' of a very bad type. The. Ruahine may have been involved in it, and is not now expected till this evening or later. The heaviest seas for many years broke on the shores of Lyall Bay and Island Bay. The ship carried a fulL cargo, ‘the largest carried by the vessel for months. The total freight for Napier and Gisborne was 450 tons, a portion being transhipments from the Port Curtis, Tahiti and Moeraki.

THOROUGH SEARCH OF COAST. NO LIKELIHOOD OF SURVIVORS. HATCHES WASHED UP. MASTER,TON, Aug. 8. From the wreckage picked up on the East Coast, with the body of a. seaman, it is evident that the Ripple has foundered, and it is unlikely that there are any survivors. A rabbiter at the Flat Point station this morning discovered a 20-foot lifeboat, with the name s.s. Ripple, on the beach near the landing stage; It was fully provisioned, with loose oars and a mast nearby, and the body of a seaman clothed in a singlet-, shirt and blue jersey, and wearing a lifebelt. He was a powerfully built man of apparently 55 years of age, clean shaven, with long red hair and heavy eyebiows. .The searchers also discovered an air-tight compartment and some boxes.

theory is that the crew took to the_ lifeboat when the vessel foundered, and drifted or sailed up the coast-. Owmg to the thick weather of the last lew days it has been impossible to see anything from the shore. The coast was thoroughly searched this afternoon bv the police and settlers for five miles from the- wreckage, but no further discoveries were made. The body of the seaman was badly bruised about the limbs and one side of the head, apparently by contact with the rooks

I Late to-night the Age received information from White Rock stating that about- ten miles from Capo Palliser ten barrels of tar and pieces of a batch had been washed ashore on the- beach there, which, it is feared, is evidence that the Ripple foundered somewhere in that locality. As she reported herself in distress at Capo Palliser on Thursday morning, she seems to have sunk not long afterwards.

This afternoon the coast was thoroughly searched for a distance- of five miles from the wreckage, but no other, bodies were found, though the oars on the beach suggest that the boat was Lilli 7 manned when she left the ship. It is possible that another boat still at sea, and not the one which was- cast ashore, would - have held the whole crew. The police from Tinui, Masterton, Carterton and Martinborough are taking part with the settlers in the searching of the coast from Palliser Bay to the Aohauga River. There is a. very strong northerly current along the coast. When the Oha-u sank in Cook Strait thirty years ago the wreckage drifted ashore at Mataikona, 100 miles north. McAlister, the second mate of the Ripple, was the sole survivor of a wreck at Cape Turnagain many years ago. Barton was not a passenger, being at present in Napier. NAPIER, Aug. 8. Advice has been received in Napier that- two of the Ripple’s hatches and ten cases of deck cargo have been washed ashore at White Rock, which is 20 miles south of Flat Point, O. Dybdale, mentioned in the Wellington telegram as one of the crew signed off on the last trip. The company does not at -present know of the men named Bruce and Thomasen on the ship and it is thought here that Robert Nelson signed on at- Wellington. for the present- trip. Squires is believed to belong to Gisborne. D. Crawford (cook) was also on board. Gthenuse. the Wellington list- is confirmed. REFERENCES IN PARLIAMENT. FULL INQUIRY TO BE MADE. ABSENCE OF WIRELESS. (By Telegraph.—Special to the Star.) WELLINGTON, Aug. 9. In addition to feeling • references to the Ripple disaster, there was a protest by a Labour member in the House to-niglit against the absence of wireless on this class of vessel.

“I rise to speak of one matter only, and it is a matter of life and death,"’ said. Mr. Fraser (Wellington Central). The hearts of the whole of the people of , New Zealand have been stirred during the last two days in connection with the sad news about the steamer Ripple and the fate which, apparently, has either overtaken her or which she is enduring at the present time. We are hopeful that instead of the tragedy revealed by the lifeboat and the body which have come ashore, that still the ship herself has gone further up the coast and has sought and obtained some harbour of refuge, but we do not know, and we have no means of knowing. The feelings of each and all of us we understand. Some of us have constituents on board the ship; some of us have neighbours on board the ship, and our feelings we can translate. What the feelings of the relatives and families are at present we can hardly even imagine. We have no means of knowing. There is no wireless installation aboard that ship, to the discredit-, be it said, of the Parliament of this country, which has not seen to the matter earlier. This matter has been brought up repeatedly on the floor of this House. 1 personally have brought it up, and also other members. There is a- question on the Order Paper at present-. This Parliament has power, and the Government has power, and 1 am going to appeal to the Premier. Ask him to tell us definitely to-night that from now on-, wards no ship, passenger or cargo vessel, will leave our ports without a wireless installation, so that the men who go down to the sea in ships and battle with the waves, and upon whom so mpeh of the prosperity of the country depends, and who always play their part nobly and well, will have their ships equipped- with the most scientific and up-to-date method of communication. . Everybody in this country is watching anxiously, and hoping against hope, even when they fear the worst in regard to the Ripple.” The Premier made sympathetic reference to the disaster and to the mourning which has been caused in many homes. He did not wish to prejudice anything, because there would be an exhaustive inquiry into what had taken place, and an attempt would he made, he hoped successfully, to find out the cause of what had occurred. Speaking for his colleagues, the Minister for Marine said he could say that nothing would be left undone to prevent a recurrence of the disaster such as had happened at our doors.

DOUBT ABOUT PASSENGERS. WELLINGTON, Aug 9 A doubt still exists as to whether two passengers are aboard the Ripple These are R. E. Tavlor and P Lendan. Taylor is an accountant for A. D. Kdey and Co., Wellington, and is married with a family grown up. Taylor served in the war and was a powerful swimmer, but suffered from poor health as a result of war injuries He booked on Wednesday, and is believed sailing 6 J ° lned the ship at the time of Lendan booked for Napier on Tuesday but it is uncertain what bis movements were afterward. His place of lesidenee is unknown. • The ship carried the largest car<*o for months, totalling 450 tons, but no machinery or motor ears. Af T ]fo I ? ipple is a single-screw steamer nt 413 tons gross. Her length is 141 lift qfn bGa^ 24 feet \ and her depth ion- ? A v f ssel was built in 1900 for the Canterbury Company, and was bought by the Richardson Company 14 years ago. She has been enFa K st- C fW e t T iT J the WollingtonCoast wool and produce trade.