Cable Steamer Returns to Auckland

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 65, 18 March 1937, Page 3

Cable Steamer Returns to Auckland

FATAL FIRE IN HONG KONG. Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, March 16. Looking trim and smart after her complete overhaul recently in llongKong, the Cable and Wireless, Ltd., steamer Recorder returned to Auckland after an absence of eight and a-halt months and anchored near the naval base. Apart from the three months she spent in dock, she has been very busily engaged on her work of cable repair. After a week in Auckland, she will leave again to give needed attention to the cable between here and Sydney. The Recorder, which was for many years known as the Iris, left Auckland on June 30 of last year for Norfolk Island, in the neighbourhood of which she effected several cable repairs. Having coaled at Sydney, she went on to Singapore, stopping to carry out repairs off Tort Darwin on the way. With Singapore as her base, the Recorder was kept very busy on the cable lines between Penang, {Singapore and Batavia until, on November 7, she went off' to Taikoo dockyards at llong-Kong for an extensive overhaul aud a special survey that occupied about three months. The Recorder was lying alongside the dock and the work had only just started upon her when a lire broke out in the fore hold that occasioned loss of life aud for a time threatened serious damage to the ship. The outbreak was llrst discovered about 0 p.m., and it was not until the next morning that it was subdued. The fire brigade on the dock side poured iu water, and the vessel’s main engines pumped through the ballast tanks until the hold was llooded. When the fight was over, it was discovered that a Chinese coolie of the ship’s company, about 17 years of age, had been overcome with the fumes aud Lad lost his life. He had apparently been working in the hold when the outbreak occurred. The actual cause of the outbreak was never discovered, but, fortunately, the damage proved com paratively easy to repair. On returning to Singapore from llong-Kong the Recorder received orders to return to New Zealand. She has been steaming particularly well as a result of her refitting and averaged 11 knots on the way from Singapore to Sydney. When off Gladstone, on tin* Queensland coast, she struck a soverc storm, aud as a result of a sea coming aboard, the crew suffered two casualties. They were Chinese stokers, one of whom had a broken thigh and the other a severe wound on the head. They wore sent to hospital and one of them will rejoin the Recorder here next week.