AMAZING WRECK STORY.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 August 1926, Page 11

AMAZING WRECK STORY.

CREW GET ASHORE FIRST. PASSENGERS SAVE THEMSELVES. Calcutta, July 24. ■Seven of the passengers from the Messageries Maritimes steamer Fontainbleu (10,000 tons), which was destroyed by fire off Jibuti)- French Somaliland, on the night of July 11, were landed at Bombay to-day from the P. and O. steamer Razmak. Mr. J. S. Bradford, one of the seven, said that a terrific wind had brought up a heavy sea at the time the fire broke out, but the passengers were not informed of their peril. When they did become aware, of their awful predicament, they were astonished to find that no attempt was made to pump water to the fore part of the ship, which was the first ablaze. A French army sergeant, who was travelling with his little daughter, attempted to save his belongings, but was prevented from entering liis cabin, revolver shots being fired to dissuade him ■from his purpose. Umrt'-nl.ly the passengers had to take things into own hands, and, unaided, managed to get off in some of the ship’s lifeboats. Fortunately, the land was not far off, ard at- three o’clock in the morning, in pitch darkness, they reached the shore. There they found the reason for the absence of rescue operations, and the necessity for their getting themselves away in the liftboats as they had done—the crew was already ashore.

The Fontsir'deau, which was built in 1923, was 479 ft long. The Razmak is one of the P. and O. Company’s latest vessels, having been Munched last year. Jibuti, or Djibouti, which has a population of 83U0, of whom 190 are French, is the capital of French Somaliland, a tract of 5790 square miles on the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, opposite Aden, and nearly 2000 miles from Bombay. In being the locality of this latest maritime sensation .the strait?., live up to the reputation which gave them their name-- ' Gate of Tears,’*