PHENOMENAL FOGS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3774, 13 July 1926, Page 16

PHENOMENAL FOGS.

SYDNEY HARBOUR TRAFFIC.

NERVE-RACKING EXPERIENCES. SYDNEY, July 1.

The fogs which Sydney has been experiencing are the worst for the last 67 years. What the fogs were like in Sydney before that is not known, for the records go back only that far, but it is hardly conceivable that the recent fogs have had any parallel in Sydney. They have blotted out the whole of the harbour and Circular quay as though they had slipped into immeasurable space. Like a vast, ghostly pall, they have enveloped everything—the harbour, the ferries, wharves, everything. How the ferries have groped their way with only one collision—and even that was unattended by casualties—is something of a miracle Only those who have been on the crowded ferries as they have blindly groped their way in the early morning, amidst the shrill blasts of sirens, suggesting the lamentation of lost ships, the ringing of bells on lighted wharves, and fog bells, can understand how nerveracking it has been for the skippers. To be able to see not 10 yards ahead of you, to find suddenly another towering vessel looming up alongside of you or coming at you head-on, and just missing it by a few feet, to find yourself hopelessly out of your course, or amidst an inextricable tangle of crowded ferries, has beep the experience, morning after morning, of the ferry masters. That they have got a vast army of people safely to work each day, even if a little late, is a tribute to their coolheadedness and judgment, blended with not a little good luck. For a shocking disaster to have occurred in one of these very dense fogs was the easiest thing possible. When one thinks of these fogs and the ferry and other traffic even in good weather, the marvel is that Sydney has been so immune from disasters on the harbour. It says something for the level headedness and skill of men who have in their hands countless thousands of lives each day.