TURBULENT TASMAN

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 97, 27 April 1933, Page 7

TURBULENT TASMAN

THE WAINUI BUFFETED WATER IN ENGINE ROOM MELBOURNE, April 26. The Wainui arrived at Victoria docks two days late on the voyage from Bluff, having been severely battered in a hurricane. Officers told of the battle against the storm, which the ship ran into soon after she cleared the Bluff, and which lasted until almost in sight of tho Victorian coast. “The seventy mile an hour gale and seas that blotted out the horizon made us dance about like a cork and at times threatened to overwhelm us, sai'l one ofiicer. “At 2 o’clock on Saturday afternoon a sea crashed over the starboard side and lifted a life boat off tho chocks and hurled it along the dock, breaking a skylight. Water poured down into the engine room and the engineers and greasers on watch thought the ship was foundering. A few minutes after a seaman at great risk had rescued the starboard life boat, a port lifeboat suffered a similar fate and had to be lashed. The Wainui was then hove to for five hours. “The sailors were forced to keep a continuous watch on six prize horses and a bull. As they wore tossed about, they had difficulty in keeping ‘heir feet. However, they were not seriously hurt.” The Wainui’s master described the crowing of the Tasman as tho worst ho had ever known. Cale conditions continue along tho coast with very rougn seas.