FATE OF CANASTOTA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 17872, 29 August 1921, Page 6

FATE OF CANASTOTA.

SHIP'S BENZINE CARGO.

INCIDENT AT BRISBANE.

MEN OVERCOME BY FUMES.

The steamer Canastota, which left Sydney for Wellington on June 13, is 73 days overdue to-day, and it is generally accepted in shipping circles that she is a total loss.

The vessel carried a cargo of benzine on the voyage from America to Australia and this was discharged at Brisbane, being replaced with a similar cargo for return to the United States. "While we are not in a position to state that this shipment was in a damaged conditisn," says a Sydney paper, " and likely to cause the vessel to explode, we can at least detail certain happenings at Brisbane."

The writer goes on to state that while attempting to unload steel piping from one of the holds when the ship was still at Brisbane, the watersiders were severely affected by fumes. Two or three men collapsed and had to be removed from the hold. At this stage all hands went up on deck to the pure air and communicated with the union secretary. The latter, who subsequently went down himself, -together with several representatives of the Steamship Owners' Association, found himself ready to collapse a few minutes after going below. The steel piping was not unloaded at Brisbane.

Another attempt was mac'e at Newcastle to unload the remaicder of the steel piping that lay in the adjoining hold. A gang of men went below, but had been there but a short time when they found the atmosphere so heavily charged wtih fumes that they had to come on deck. The fumes bad apparently got through from the benzine, and sinking, lodged in the piping, making it impossible for men to remain below for any length of time. Once more the wharf labourers declined to go on. From King's Wharf, where she first lay in Newcastle, the Canastota moved across to the basin to take in coal. A further attempt was made here to get the piping out of the hold on to a lighter alongside. An extra shilling an hour was offered the men to go below. The men who were to handle it on the lighter demanded this concession also, but no agreement was arrived at, and, with the exception of a very small proportion, the piping remained in No. 4 hold.

Leaving Newcastle on June 2, the ship came on to Sydney and loaded more benzine. As this, as well as that already aboard the vessel had been handled once or twice previously, it is not unreasonable to assume, says the writer, that at least a portion of it must have ibeen in the same condition.

The immediate cause of the disaster that all agree has happened to the'Canastota will never be known, he adds. We can only assume that the fumes came into contact with fire somewhere aboard the ship.

PREVIOUS DISASTER RECALLED.

LOSS OP THE WAITOTARA.

The presumption that the Canastota was lost by explosion and burning recalls the loss of the Union Company's steamer Waitotara, which was burned at sea in the Pacific Ocean on June 10, 1917. Her cargo of copra and oils was valued at £250,000. The fire was discovered at 11 and owing to the inflammable nature of the cargo spread rapidly, despite all the efforts of the crew to suppress it. In fact, so quickly did the fire spread that the captain, who was in hiy' bunk when the alarm was given, and did not stay to dress, could not get hack to his room, and had to leave the ship in his pyjamas. After three hours' work fighting the flames the task was seen to be hopeless, so the crew took to the boats, which had been lowered as a precautionary measure, and lay off the burning vessel. A French vessel, which had received the Waitotara's wireless call for assistance, reached the spot 24 hours later and picked up the crew. By that time the Waitotara was burning furiously fore and aft, and as it was impossible for the rescuing steamer to get near her, she did not remain, but took the crew to Noumea.