SUPPOSED DISASTER.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XXI, Issue 1105, 7 February 1891, Page 3

SUPPOSED DISASTER.

RETURN OF THE HIN'EMOA. THE KAKANUI SUPPOSED TO HAVE FOUNDERED. NINETEEN LIVES "SUPPOSED TO BE LOST. Dunedix, Feb. 5. The Government steamer flmemoa has arrived at the Bluff from Macquarrie Islands: She reports that the Kakanui arrived there oii January 2nd and left again on the 3rd for the Bluff, taking away eight out of ten persons there. She had on b'dard besides these her own crew of eleven. Two days after leaving Macquarrie Tsland a fearful westerly gale was experienced, and it is probable that the .Kakanui foundered in that gale. The people on Macquarrie's had plenty rice, flour and biscuits, and also ate penguins' eggs and part of the bird itself, so there is no foundation for all the fuss made about the people starving there, and the Kakanui went on a less mission as the people on the Islands were quite right. A thorough search has been made off the Auckland Islands, Snares, Solander's Traps and all the outlying islands, but no trace of anyone has been found.

The gale experienced at Ma<-quarrie's after the Kakanui left was so violent that casks of oil were blown along the beach and a hut blown down. Capt. Fairchild fears that it is only too likely that the Kakanui experienced that gale and has foundered, as when she left Macquarrie's she was very deep and had apparently a good stock on coals onboard.