Fierce Explosion Wrecks Big Launch

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 762, 7 September 1929, Page 1

Fierce Explosion Wrecks Big Launch

BATTLE WITH FLAMES VESSEL A TOTAL LOSS With a terrific explosion the harbour launch Te Awa blew up and was completely destroyed, following on a fierce half-hour blaze yesterday afternoon. The launch was owned by Captain J. Texiera, and was moored at Pine Island with the engine running, to charge the battery. Captain Texiera, who was on the wharf, saw fire burst from the engine-room, and rushed on board to get a fire-extinguisher. Owing to the intense heat, however, he could not get near the wheelhouse, where it was kept. Some time after the fire started Mr. R. Maypell, of the Upper Harbour Ferry Company, arrived at Pine Island with a load of passengers on the launch Tawa, and gave assistance in fighting the flames with *an extinguisher from his launch. The fire had by this time eaten through the partition into the cabin, but Mr. Maynell rushed into the cabin, seized blankets and rugs and jammed them into the hole through which the flames had come, thus getting the fire at the after end of the launch under control. Unfortunately the acid in the extinguisher gave out, and another was secured from a nearby launch, but before it could be used the benzine tank on the Te Awa burst, and flames flashed over the vessel, which was doomed within a few minutes. Mr. Maynell then climbed on the cockpit and chopped a hole in the bottom to sink the launch, but the tide was too low', and the Te Awa merely settled in the mud and blazed until only the belting and stem were left. Te Awa was a well-known harbour launch much used for summer excursions. It was insured with the New Zealand Insurance Company for £6OO.