HURRICANE AT KOWAI.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 85, 16 May 1914, Page 2

HURRICANE AT KOWAI.

CAMP ENTIRELY DEMOLISHED;

MEN RETURN TO CHRISTCHURCH,

All the bad weather of the initial

«amp at Kowai was eclipsed yesterday J>y a hurricane, which swept round Mount Torlesse and devastated the

-camp.' At midnight on Thursday a strong north-west gale was blowing,

jand before daylight a wind estimated to be blowing at 80 miles per hour, laid the camp low. One of the first tents to*go was the Y.M.C.A. marquee. It

was flattened to the ground, and its contents were scattered to the four poinds o,f the compass. A large table soared into the air to a height of 25ft. It passed over a knot of men who were struggling with the debris of the tent. They scattered quickly, but the table continued its flight for some fifty yards and, r then dived to earth. It was win ashed to. kindling wood. The big 4000-gallon tank, set on its tower;,soft up in the air, did'not shift

jfronx its moorings. What was more -wonderful still, however, was that pieces »f timber carried through the air at that height pierced the iron in many

places, and let all the water out. Camp , iettles Covered round the place-where the.icook's galley used to be before the

wind . came, and unfamiliar, objects soared into the air and glided back to «arth. A barrel of gingerbeer went ljersefk and charged down the lines. It «hased one of the A.S.C. horses for some yards, then gave up the pursuit, jumped a wire fence and wept beery tears on, the railway line to show its displeasure. The store, a long corrugated iron Irailding, was demolished and the sheets of l roofing, twisted into every., cpn- : «eiyable shape, were scattered for hunidreds of yards around. Soriie of them werb found in most extraordinary

«bapes. One piece was driven down over a fence post. The tents were not «nly. blown, down, many of ithem, were -torn;, to ribbons. When the cookliouse s *Ussplved into thin air one man took JHOSt of the starboard wall in the small #f his back and was badly bruised.

3)6spite the- fact that the galley was< gopeand the store stood out in tbe : rain uncovered,- the cook rose to the ocmaq'xon, and at 7.30 a.m. he had a hot , Jweakfast ready for all hands. Then it , rained steadily for some hours,' arid it ■■ ■was decided to break camp. The men arrived back in town at.about 6 o'clock Jast night, wet, but cheerful and even i enthusiastic. ' ' ' :

It was quite-impossible to go On with the Saturday's training, and it was equally impossible that, ,the camp should be struck before the men left. As it was left it looked like a large drying green, and the whole' spectacle was particularly desolate. .. Captains Critchley-Salmonsen and Robinson, witji a detail from the Army Service Corps, have stayed behind to pack up and elcar' away *he wreck of what was once -the-camp.