ABLAZE IN MID-ATLANTIC.

Manawatu Times, Volume LXIV, Issue 284, 9 December 1907, Page 3

ABLAZE IN MID-ATLANTIC.

PANIC ON A LINER,

Hindered by hundreds of panicstricken emigrants, the officers of the Austrian liner Giulia worked theif burniurf ship through a mMAtlantic storm, and brought her, battered and charred, into Brooklyn harbour.

She carried a crew of 90 men and over 800 passengers, manv of whom had their faces and hands bandaged and were suffering from wounds and other injuries.

The Giulia left Trieste on September 14th, calling at Grecian ports, and then proceeded across the Atlantic On the morning of the Thursday, October 3rd, soon after aonrise, the alarm of fire coursed through the ship, which was then labouring heavily in the teeth of a storm. When the smoke was seen filtering up through the hatches, some of the passengers raised an alarm, and there was a wild scene of confusion in the steerage quarters. Men, women, and children fought in the narrow gangway to gain the deck. When the hatches were < raised and the smoke and flames were seen pouring up, the steerage passengers went mad with fright.

Some of the steerage berths were so near the fire that the iron partitions became redhot, and before the last passenger had gained the deck the steerage quarters were filled with smoke. When the terrorstricken emigrants reached the deck they made a frantic rush for the lifeboats, tore off the canvas covers, and climbed in. When all the places were taken, those who were unable to get .in knelt on the deck and prayed.' Several attempts were made to launch the boats, and if they had been successful many lives must have been lost. Some of the cabin passengers tried to persuade the emigrants to be calm and trust to the officers and crew, but they might as well have talked to the wind.

They were quickly joined by a portion of the crew, who, throwing down the hoses, mutinously declared that nothing could save the ship from utter destruction. In a few brief minutes one of ihe lifeboats aft was unloosed. Before the mutineers, however, could launch it, the captain, summoning around him a dozen stalwart seamen, drove the cowards with levelled revolvers back to their posts. Most of the panic-stricken women, children and male passengers, after a fierce struggle, were next forced beneath the hatches where, shrieking in frenzy, they were immured.

But the men, after the mutiny was quelled, struggled heroically with the raging flames.

Streams of water were poured into the hold, where 24,000 barrels of dried grapes and figs were blazing. It seemed, however, to have no effect. Man after man, choked by the flames, fell exhausted. > The situation seemed helpless. Suddenly an immense wave rose up over the port bow, broke and crashed down through the open hatch, falling with a thunderous noise into the hold. As though Niagara had descended on them, the flames sizzled and roared, and then, emitting dense clouds of steam and smoke, subsided.

Ihe passengers who were released, and the crew, fell on their knees, and with the gale tngging at hair and clothing, offered up thanks to the Almighty for their deliverance.

When the flames were finally subdued the panic-stricken passengers who had taken refuge in the life* boat refused to leave, and remained there twelve hours longer.

The captain, however, adopted the plan of starving them out. The stewards were ordered to supply no food to those in the boats, and at the end of the second day they had all returned to their quarters in the steerage.