RECORD RUN.

Waipawa Mail, Volume LXVI, Issue 9, 4 October 1937, Page 3

RECORD RUN.

AWATEA PUTS UP NEW TIME. WELLINGTON, This day. Smashing all previous records for the Tasman crossing by an ample margin and beating her own record set up less than a. month ago by 2 hours 34 minutes, the Union Company’s express liner Awatea arrived at Sydney Heads at 10.35 p.m. yesterday after a remarkably fast passage of 55 hours from Auckland, at an average speed of over 23 knots. From noon on Saturday to noon yesterday the ship covered 576 nautical miles, equivalent to 663 statute land miles, at an average speed of 23.35 knots—easily the fastest day’s run ever made by a merchant ship in the Southern Hemisphere. The Awatea having- passed Rangitoto beacon at 5.37 p.m. on Friday, her arrival at Sydney Heads at 10.35 p.m. last night would make the passage 52 hours 58 minutes, plus 2 hours’ difference in time (including half an hour summer time in New Zealand), a total of 54 hours 58 minutes. On her passage last month, which was marked by strong- head winds and seas, the Awatea made the run in 57 hours 32 minutes, so that she now has bettered that record by 2 hours 34 minutes. Her average speed for the September passage was 22.07 knots, as against over 23 knots for the run completed last night. Thus the Awatea has beaten the Monterey’s record from Auckland to Sydney by fully three hours.