PASSENGERS INTERVIEWED.

Colonist, Volume LV, Issue 13736, 30 May 1913, Page 5

PASSENGERS INTERVIEWED.

THE COLLISION DESCRIBED

ABSENCE OF PANIC.

(Received May 29, 10.30 p.m.) London, May 29

Passengers interviewed at Plymouth state that the Tainui ran into tho fog on Saturday afternoon, and it was impossiblo to see a few yards ahead. At seven o'clock on Sunday morning the Inca suddenly loomed up out of the mist, and her bows collided with the

Tainui

Many of tho passengers were on deck and saw tho Inca's crew, some of them half-naked, rushing to the boats. Before they lost sight of the vessel the forward part of the Tainui began to dip, until a few hours after the propeller was visible out of the water. The boats on the promenade dock wero lowored. The wireless calls reached the Garth Castle, which was forty miles away, but it was ten o'clock in the evoning 'before sho roached the .Tainui. The fog was still dense.

The majority of the passengers went to sleep, and somo undressed. The situation, however, became steadily worse, and they were . awakened at three o'clock on Monday morning and told to don lifebelts in readiness to be transferred to the Garth Castle. This was safoly accomplished in an hour in the Tainui's boats. The Garth Castle's boats, forming a line, acted as guides between the vessels, which were threequarters of a mile apart.

Boat drill was practised on the Tair.ui 18 hours earlier, just beforo the

fog came on

The passengers were accommodated in the saloons and steerage rooms on the Garth Castle. Many of the latter's male passengers gave up their berths.