FIRE ON LINER

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21934, 18 October 1934, Page 11

FIRE ON LINER

MORRO CASTLE DISASTER FINDING OF NEGLIGENCE (Received October 17, 6.15 p.m.) NEW YORK. Oct. 1G The report of the Marine Board of Inquiry set up to investigate the burning of the liner Morro Castle, on September 8, with the loss of 132 lives, has been issued. It charges acting-Captain W. P. Warms, and four of the ship's officers with negligence. No cause of the fire is given in the report, and no responsibility for it is fixed. The officers named have been ordered to appear at a hearing on October 29, to show cause why their certificates should not be suspended or revoked . The report states that when the alarm of fire was sounded the crew did not take stations nor did the officers do anything to organise them. A further charge is that the ship continued at full speed for some distance after the fire was reported. "It was not until the fire was out of control that the course was changed and the vessel slowed down. The call for assistance also was delayed," the report states. The four officers who arc charged with negligence, as well as acting-Cap-tain Warms, are: —The chief engineer, E. S. Abbott; the second officer, Clarence Hackney; the third officer, Harold Hansen; and the first assistant engineer, Antonio Bnijia. The acting-chief officer, Ivan Freeman, alone among the deck officers, is not involved in the negligence charge.