TERRIBLE WEATHER

Otago Witness, Issue 3019, 24 January 1912, Page 29

TERRIBLE WEATHER

GALES AND SNOW IN BRITAIN.

SHIPPING DISASTERS,

MANY PEOPLE KILLED

SNOW FOR THIRTY HOURS

LONDON, January 18. A gale is raging in Great Britain. Numerous fatalities and much damage to harbour works and shipping are reported. A German steamer was wrecked on the Goodwins. The Ramsgate lifeboat gallantly rescued 20 of her crew.

A large unknown steamer was seen to turn turtle and founder off Petershead. There was such a terrific gale that it was not possible to help her crew. Other wrecks are reported from all parts of the coast.

A lifeboat followed the steamer Wistowhall for five hours, during which the tide was like a maelstrom. The steamer was dashed on the Bailers of Buchan Rocks (off the coast of Aberdeen). Four of the crew, including the captain, were saved, and 53, mostly lascars, were drowned. There has been 36 hours’ snowfall in the Midlands. Trains are seriously delayed, and tons of salt have been used to thaw the snow. The weight of ice coating the wires in many localities dragged the poles down.

Fifteen thousand miners have been thrown out of work at Cannock Chase owing to the difficulty of moving the railway trucks through the snowstorm now raging.

January 19. The wild weather continues, and snow has been falling in many districts for 30 hours. It is the heaviest for 40 years. An Aberdeen steamer, with 14 hands, foundered off Port Errol.

The steamer Wes tow Hall, which was wrecked on Friday, left Jarrow on Monday. Heavy seas destroyed her funnel, broke her boats, and extinguished the fires in the engine-room. She drifted helplessly, the crew being foodless and without sleep for three days. They were unable to reach the forecastle, and lay huddled together in the engine-room. Then she struck.

A Port Errol lifeboat made gallant efforts to rescue the crew, who were clinging to ropes and ventilators and derricks, but the breakers rendered their rescue impossible. The fishermen waded through the boiling surf neck deep, and dragged ashore Captain Stoddart and three lascars. Captain Stoddart revived after an hour’s artificial respiration. He was confined in his cabin with .a broken arm and internal injuries at the time of hie steamer foundering. He remembered nothing of further events until he found himself ashore