STEAMERS FOR SCRAP

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21815, 1 June 1934, Page 10

STEAMERS FOR SCRAP

FATE OF COASTAL BOATS CLANSMAN'S CAREER ENDS WAIOTAHI AND NGATIAWA Threo steamers which, in their day, were among the best-known vessels on the Auckland waterfront, but which of recent years have been consigned to the obscurity of a place in "Rotten Row" in Shoal Bay, will shortly part company with Auckland for good. A decision to break them up for scrap was announced yesterday by Mr. E. H. Davis, chairman of directors of the Northern Steamship Company, Limited. The three vessels, the Clansman, Waiotahi and Ngatiawa, were once popular and up-to-date coastal craft. The Clansman, the largest of the three, had considerably the longest active life, being the first built and the last to join the melancholy group in Shoal Bay. She is a steel screw steamer, built in 1884 by Blackwood and Gordon, of Glasgow. She is 635 tons gross, and 191 feet in length by 26 feet in beam. Built for the passenger traffic, sho is perhaps the best known of all the vessels that have traded in North Auckland. She was running to Russell, Whangaroa and Mangonui when the "winterless north" was practically the "roadless north," and conveyed many of the present settlers and their belongings to their future homes. Later for many years the Clansman ran to North Auckland and Tauranga alternately. On March 14, 1931, she broke her tail shaft off Cape Brett, and she was soon afterward withdrawn from the service, owing to slackness of trade. Long records of faithful service also stand to the credit of the other two vessels. The Waiotahi, a steel twin-screw steamer of 278 tons_ gross, was built by the Abercorn Ship Building Company, Paisley, in 1891. The vessel was built for the Opotiki traffic, and had special provision for the carriage of maize, which at the time was a big item 'in cargoes from the Bay of Plenty. She later ran to Parenga and Great Barrier Island. The Ngatiawa was one of three vessels ordered by the Northern Company in 1905, the others being the Aupouri and the Apanui. She was on the Opotiki run for many years, and also traded to northern ports and on the West Coast. She is a steel twin-screw steamer of 451 tons gross.- The Waiotahi and Ngatiawa were both laid up about seven years ago. Both vessels were, during their careers, stranded on the Opotiki bar, the Ngatiawa at one time being there for a week, but neither suffered any very serious damage.