Permanente Arrives at Auckland

Manawatu Times, Volume 70, Issue 277, 23 November 1945, Page 5

Permanente Arrives at Auckland

(Per Press Association.) AUCKLAND, Nov. 22. With more than 200 passengers on board, the .10,000-ton vessel Permanente arrived at Auckland this afternoon and anchored in the stream. .She will berth probably to-morrow afternoon, ‘ but there is a possibility that the passengers will be brought ashore before that. The Permanente was originally due on Wednesday, but a breakdown in one engine after leaving Rarotonga considerably reduced her speed. She ran into heavy weather and it was not expected that she would arrive before Sunday. However, the weather improved and she began to make better speed. A change in the wind further aided her progress.

Most of the passenger are the wives and children of New Zealand servicemen who married iu Canada and the United States. Among the others are tho first Russian Minister to New Zealand, Mr. Ivan K. Ziabkin, his wife and member of his staff and their families.

It was hoped to bring the passengers ashore to-day in a ferry boat. However, rough conditions on the harbour and the fact that the passengers would have had to climb down the ship’s side by a rope ladder caused this arrangement to be abandoned.

The Under-Secretary for Air, Mr. John Strachey, replying to a question in the House of Commons, stated that about 2500 R.A.F. personnel are missing as a result of operations in the Far East. Machinery for tracing them was ■flnly just getting into its stride., he said.