SOUTHERLY GALE

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVI, Issue 8181, 24 July 1912, Page 1

SOUTHERLY GALE

RAIN, HAIL. AND SLEET.

COASTAL STEAMERS HAVE ROUGH TIME. PRESS ASSOCIATION. CHRISTCHURCH, July 53. After a brief spell of two days’ fine weather a boisterous southerly gale blew up the coast yesterday, bringing with it heavy rain, hail, and sleet. This morning the hills round Lyttelton harbour were coated with snow and bail. The gale came with a rising barometer, the reading at Lyttelton at 9 o’clock this morning being 30.54. The squalls last night were very violent, and along the coast a hard south-west gale was blowing.

Steamers coming from Wellington had a very dirty night, and the force of the galo waa such that the Maori was delayed over an hour on her pun down to Lyttelton. She left Wellington wharf at 8 o’clock last night, and ran into a strong southerly gale, with a high sea outside the heads. She had a very stormy passage across Cook Strait and down the coast, with frequent fierce hail and sleet squalls. The Maori made good time against the gale, and passed the big cargo steamers Morayshire and AngloSaxon, which had left Wellington shortly after 4 p.m., about midnight, a little to the southward of Cape Cqmnbell. The Maori was kept going at full speed all night, but the wind and sea did not abate until she had passed Cheviot, ard she berthed at Lyttelton wharf shortly after 8 o’clock this morning, missing her connection with the first express for the south.