CALL TO LORD HOWE

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 43, 20 January 1936, Page 2

CALL TO LORD HOWE

MONOWAI IN TIME. AN EPIC DASH. Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, Jan. 19. In a special wireless message to the New Zealand Press Association, Mr Eric Baume, a. passanger aboard the Monowai, says: “Shortly before midnight on Saturday Mrs W. S. Nicholls, in a semiconscious condilion was hoisted aboard the Monowai, SJeli was lying a quarts* of a mile off Lord Howe Island, in the North Tasman Sea. The mate of the Monowai. Mr Ramsay, and the sick woman’s husband, hold her in an armchair on a quickly rigged flooring, and they were raised to the upper deck as the steamer dipped and raised to an enormous ground swell. Six hours after having reached Lord Howe Island the M onowai took up her running to Auckland, where she will arrive on Tuesday morning.” The deviation of the Monowai on an errand of mercy is one of the stories of sea courage which will remain in Tasman history. “Faced with heavy seas the islanders came to the Monowai in open boats with auxiliary engines, so that one of the community might have a chance for life. In spite of a long agitation the New South Wales Government had refused to appoint a doctor for the island. Radio told the story to all ships and to the Government of Mrs Niclioils’s plight, and the Monowai, as she carried 382 passengers, Royal Mail and 2500 tons of cargo, and was laden to her Plimsoll, averaged 18 knots as she plunged into the deviation of 200 miles in heavy seas

“Captain Davey received the call for help on Friday night. R.v 7.30 p.m. on Saturday the Monowai was rolling in the big seas off Lord Howe Island. Captain Davev. without any charts and without fuss, achieved somethin."- in Tasman seamanship.' Lord Howe Island has its shoals and it* reefs and its submerged rocks. Captain Davey’s first requests by radio to the is'and station, at which the operators, Messrs Stan Fenton and John Olio bad been on duty for 43 hours without rest, was for the nat’put’s condition. The shin’s operator Mr Lionel Jones, of Sydney, also without rest from 8 p.m. on Friday. received details of the more obvious shoals, and Captain Davev then awa'ted the islanders’ arrival in open boats. Lord Howe Island consists of precipitous cliffs. 2800 feet high. There is a 100 yards’ lve >k in the 'oral rvl. on which the surf breaks incessantly, alhiwin v l;lu> islanders’ boats to enter a long lagoon “On board a special operating table had been made from a big piece of Ijiiri. This had been fitted with detachable supports, which could ho clamped into place, constructed by the ship’s carpenter. An electrician bad then constructed, at the captain’s orders, a special electric battery lighting system, which could be taken ashore and fitted at the sick woman’s home should an immediate operation be necessary. All the operating gear was prepared by the ship’s surgeon. Dr Walker, and Dr Butterfield, a young Hawke’s Bay doctor, who is a passenger, and Nurse Anderson, who has had experience in the Gulf of Carpentaria, offered tlieir services, though warned of the danger of the heavy seas. “At the jetty most of the islanders were waiting. Drays took the doctors, the nurse and the operating equipment to Mrs Nicholls’s homo, where her husband and three children were waiting. After a consultation it was decided not to attempt an operation, but to .endeavour, if the sea abated and the ■wind dropped, to carry Mrs Nicholls out to the Monowai and take her to Auck'and for observation.

“Within three hours, during which time T learned of the attempts which had been made to obtain a doctor, it was decide*! to make an attempt to reach the Monowai with Mrs Nicholls. Under the mate, Mr Ramsay's, directions, we slung her into a basket covered with blankets and tarpaulins, and carefully balanced the whaleboat. T have never seen such courage as she showed. She could barelv speak, but she smiled. Without mishap we got back through the huge ground swell. It was then that the superb seamanship of Mr Ramsay achieved the almost impossible. With assistance he rigged a stage and this was attached to a crane on the upper deck. The mate and the woman’s husband stood one on each side of the patient, balancing the crazy stage, and they were safely hauled 40 fact up on board the Monowai. The crew were waiting under the captain’s directions and the patient was quickly taken to the ship’s hospital. “This is the third case at Lord Howe Island recently in which the services of ships have been called. Twice the Morinda’s doctor has had to perform operations, and a freighter was called to send a doctor to staunch bleeding.”