PORT CHALMERS.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume XXVIII, Issue 66, 18 August 1869, Page 2

PORT CHALMERS.

Abeiyed.—August 17, steamer Onieo, from the Bluff.

Steameb Chaeles Edwaed. — The Charles Edwurd, Captain Palmer, returned to Nelson on Monday, after a rapid trip of four days to Westport and Greymouth. She left here last Thursday, at 1 p.m., and reached the Buller the following day, at noon ; left for Greymouth by the same tide, where she arrived early on Saturday morning ; the Hokitika bar being unsafe, she landed all cargo and passengers, and left for Westport at 5 p.m. same day, arriving there at 5 a.m. on Sunday ; left the same afternoon for Nelson, and arrived as above. On the passage up she encountered the full force of a northerly gale, accompanied by a very heavy sea. j Steam CoarjiuxrcATion with Sydney. — The brig Gazelle, which arrived from Sydney on Sunday last, brings -word that the AS.N. Company in Sydney, whose Manager visited this colony a few weeks ago, have determined on running a steiuner between Sydney and Cook Strait, calling at Hokitika, and that tho fine steamer Rango,tira will leave on her first trip towards the latter end of the present month. Weeck Statistics.— The report of Mr. Balfour, Marine Engineer, has just been published by Government, and we learn from the wreck record that a much smaller number of casualties occurred last year than during the year previously. In 1867-8 there were no less than fifty-five wrecks, while in 1868-9 there were only thirty-three, covering a total loss of 3,736 tons, and the temporary injury of 518 tons. These losses were not as a rule attributable to gales ; but the large majority arose from want of proper moorings, thick weather, and other incidents. Of the total, thirty-three, there were four in July, three in August, five in September, eight in October, one in November, two in December, none in January, five in Februaiy; one iv March, none in April, ihrco in May, and one in June. The loss of life is comparatively small, only twenty-eight during the year, of whom twenty belonged to the ill-fated St. Vincent, wrecked in Palliser Bay. SiirrriNG- Disasters in the East.— The India and China papers supply the following particulars respecting serious disasters at sea. Quoting from the China Trade Report, we learn the following particulars : — " The British ship Great Northern was wrecked twenty-eight miles north of Bombay, fifteen lives were lost, and the captain severely injured. The British India steam Navigation Cos. steamer Cheduba, with mails and passengers from Calcutta to Rangoon, has, it is very much feared, gone down in the cyclone that passed over the Bay of Bengal on the 15th and 16th of April. Nothing has yet been heard of her, and though she may probably be drifting a helpless hulk in the Bay of Bengal, it is feared she has met the fate of the Persia, in 1864, and the Thunder, in 1867. On the western coast, too, a fine ship has been wrecked. The Bucentaur, from Liverpool, was driven ashore at the entrance of Bombay haibour on the 4th May, and has become a total wreck. Her cargo alone was worth £51,000, and no portion of it has yet been saved, as the sea is breaking heavily around the wreck. The captain and crew were all saved by the Bombay life-boat. The P. and O. Company's steamer Golconda, with the English mail of May 14, has also met with an accident on the voyage from Aden. When about half-way across, her engines broke down, and a heavy storm coming on, she was taken in tow by the Bombay and Bengal Company's steamer Krishna, on the 3rd instant, and towed for seventeen hours. The violence of the storm, however, caused the hawsers to snap one after another, and the vessels parted company at three o'clock on the morning of the 4th, when the Krishna held on her course to Bombay, where she arrived on Sunday morning, the 6th May, at nine o'clock. The P. and O. S. S. Behar was despatched the next morning to assist the disabled &teamer to Bombay. No fears aro entertained as to the safety of the vessel. — Sydney Mail, July 17.