SHORN IN TWO.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 227, 25 September 1929, Page 9

SHORN IN TWO.

OLD PASSENGER SHIP.

MIDNIGHT COLLISION.

SEVENTY-EIGHT LIVES LOST

CALIFORNIA COAST DISASTER

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

SAN FRANCISCO, September 4

Seventy-eight souls went to their death in the" Pacific Ocean in a midnight collisio'n between the coastwise steamship San Juan and the Standard Oil tanker S. C. T. Dodd in the most fearful marine disaster which has occurred on the Pacific Coast during the past twenty years. That was the estimate made on the basis of incomplete passenger and crew lists and stories of resuscitated survivors rescued by the Dodd and the steamship Munami after the San Juan had plunged, stern first, to the bottom of the ocean, carrying most of its victims trapped while asleep in their bunks and staterooms below decks.

Bit by bit, gathered from hysterical, shaken," incoherent survivors, who arrived on the Dodd in San Francisco port ill tow of the coastguard tug Shawnee, the story of horror was pieced together. According to the stories of the survivors, the 47-year-old San Juan apparently was shorn almost in two by the heavy stem of the tanker, and sank beneath "the sea before the passengers hi their staterooms and the crew members in their bunks had even an opportunity to realise the vessel had been struck. '"The ship sank in three minutes," said Augrst Olson, second officer of the San Juan. Horrible Death Lurch. For a moment after the crash the two vessels hung together. A man scrambled to safety from the San Juan to the 'Dodd, and . a small boy was handed over the railing by* a woman on the San Juan. Then, as the Dodd backed away, the old San Juan staggered and gave, her death-lurch. From "her slanting decks, tilting higher and higher for the fatal dive, arose the shrieks of terrified women, the cries of children, the horrified shouts of men, and the bellowed orders- to the crew. By ones, twos and threes, passengers and sailors scrambled to the rails and flung themselves or fell headlong into the sea. Most of these were on deck or had quarters on the upper deck. Vcw of those below had time to scramble on deck and plunge from the fast-sinking vessel. There was .no time to launch the lifeboats or don life-preservers. So sudden was the catastrophe that the order to "lower away" probably could not have been carried out. Tliat accounted for the serious charge of cowardice brought against the crew. The Dodd's lifeboats were quickly in the water. Over the black, heaving seas they cruised, picking up struggling men and women, guided bv the searchlights of the tanker and the screams for help that floated over the waves. Almost as the Dodd's boats struck the water, the fog bank, which had been lurking a mile off. swept down on the scene. It blotted out the etrujrglinff castaways, clinging to wreckage or swimming "through the heavy sens toward the boats. It dimmed the powerful searchlights of the tanker until thev gave but a feeble glow on the waters. Only the cries of the shipwrecked were left to guide the rescuers. One by one twenty-nine survivors were picked up, swimming feebly, dinging to bits of wreckage and boxes which had been swept off the decks by the crash. Fleet of Rescue Ships. Aiter the vessels struck, Clifford Paulson, first radio operator on the San Juan, barely had time to flash out, We are struck," before he was forced to jump from the radio house into the sea. He was among those picked up by the Dodd. As the steamships swung apart, the tanker's wireless spluttered its S.O.S. brin<rin« to its aid in the rescue work the Iteamer Munami, of the McCormick Line The same wireless call sent rescue ships rushing from San Francisco. In the meantime the Munami owered awav its small boats and picked up eleven survivors and they were transferred to the Shawnee, the Munami proceeding on its way to Los Angeles. Out from Santa Cruz rushed a fleet of 250 fishing boats, manned by men inured to the sea, and its perils. Scattering over the ocean off Pigeon Point thev ° began a systematic search for wreck victims, alive or dead, but then efforts were in vain. The fog, w> dense that one could see no more than 100 or 200 feet in any direction, blanketed them in. Crew Charged With Cowardice. Theodore Granstedt, one of the survivors, was unmeasured in denouncing the crew for what he described as their "cowardly desertion of the passengers, and especially the women and children. "When the crash came the entire crew deserted their posts and saved themselves," declared Granstedt. They jumped to save themselves and made no effort to launch a boat or save a soul I was in my stateroom with Mrs. Granstedt when the Dodd struck us. We jumped out of our berths and tried to switch on the electric light, but could not We threw clothing over us and weiit to the deck, the boat then having a heavy list to the port side. We stood a moment on the deck with some friends, Mr. and Mrs. John Olsen and their daughter Helen. Just then the boat took a final unexpected lunge and we were all drawn down into the whirlpool. "I saw nothing more of the others. When I came to the surface four other people were in the water near me, but not my wife nor any of the Olsens. I held on to a piece of wood and remembered nothing more until I was revived on the Dodd." Granstedt was rescued Jrom the deck of the Dodd and was the last survivor picked up by that vessel. He was suffering acutely from shock and immersion.

Another talc of the suddenness of the disaster was told by George Hainee, .steward on board the San Juan. "I heard a crash and hurried to the deck to see everybody running about madly and jumping overboard.- The ship was settling already. The captain went down with her, and as far as I know the last man to leave was Tullee, the chief officer. He turned to me and said: 'You fool, jump,' and I jumped. Lifeboat No. 1 of the Dod'd picked me up. It was well manned." Woman Gets a "Thrill." Out of the terror and tragedy of the wreck of the San Juan, Marjorie Dansby, a San Francisco girl, only woman survivor picked up and brought, home by the Dodd, still retained her sense of humour. "How do I look in these clothes?" she asked, pirouetting like a mannequin in the faded blue overalls and man's shirt donated by a member

of the Dodd's crew. "I never was so pleased with any clothes as these. All I had on was my birthday suit when they picked me up. We sat around earlier in the evening wishing for a little excitement. Well, we got it plenty, and not the kind we were looking for, either. A shipwreck is terrible, but it is a mighty thrilling experience if one lives to remember it." Mrs. Dansby was on her way to Southern California for a vacation visit to her mother and baby, she said. She shared a stateroom with another woman and was not yet asleep, though she had undressed and gone to bed when the crash came. "There was a terrific crash. I did not stop for clothes. I ran out on deck in just my nightie. Everyone was terribly frightened —knew something awful hud happened. Tho ship began to sink. 1 jumped near th& prow into the water." "Did you swim?" someone asked. "You're light I did," .«he answered. "Were you scared?" "Say," came the .sharp response, "did you ever spend threequarters of an hour in the ocean, with people screaming and sobbing around you? Oh, no, 1 wasn't scared. Xot a bit." After an interval that was in fact from half to three-quarters of an hour, but seemed like an eternity, she was picked up by one of the rescue boats and taken aboard the Dodd. She was uninjured. "Were you cold'.'" someone asked her. "I felt like. I was stepping out of a hot tub," she grinned with sarcasm, "I am a good swimmer, so I just kept moving and after a while someone, I do not know who, lifted me into a boat. So hero I am, darned lucky to be here." Mrs. Dansby, with her boyish bob still damp and curling about her forehead, looked like a girl in her 'teens. "Gee, what a kick!" was her terse comment on the whole experience. "Biggest thrill 1 ever had in my life. But I won't be sorry to get into some real clothes again and to put my feet on terra firma." Some Suffocated by Oil. Many passengers and members of the crew went down with the ship without even a lighting chance for life. Trapped in staterooms and bunks, without light, panic stricken as the ship heeled over and began to sink, men, women and children perished below the decks. Clad in night attire, scores rushed to the sloping decks. Looming alongside, so close that a 14-year-old boy and a member of the San Juan crew leaped to the safety of her steel decks without even getting wet, was the Dodd. Others tried but failed, and plunged into the sea. As the waves closed over the San Juan the Dodd's lifeboats pushed forward to the spot where the vessel went down. The swimmers had little chance for life unless supported by wreckage or life preservers.' Tons of" oil from the San Juan's tanks and boilers bubbled to the surface and spread a viscous, suffocating smear over the surface of the water. Swimmers, with mouths and nostrils filled with the deadly stuff, suffocated and drowned, strangulation resulting. Many others went down after a few minutes of brave but futile struggle against the icy chill of those Pacific waters. A Danish architect, Martin Hanson, said: "Only recently I came from Deninark. I had been unable to find work in San Francisco. We decided to go to Long Beach to try there. So we .drew our last 400 dollars from the bank and packed all our belongings in trunks, which went down with the San Juan. My wife and our two children, Eric, aged 4, and Ola, aged 0, and I were in our cabin below deck when the crash knocked us to the floor. Startled at first, we did not know what to do. But, realising our danger, my wife and I wrapped a coat about each of the children and rushed up on the port side of tho fore deck. The San Juan was already listing to port. The big tanker was right off the port bow. Itried to shout above the terrible din to someone on the tanker to catch my children. I wanted to throw them off* but I didn't have time "Without warning the San Juan rolled suddenly to port ,and we were thrown into the water. I don't know what became of my wife and the boy she held. She was a good swimmer. I cannot swim. I held the other boy with one arm. Then as I was trying to find something to cling to to keep me afloat the San Juan rolled under. The centre of it seemed to buckle and explode. I was sucked under. It must have knocked me unconscious. When I came to I was on the surface again. My boy was gone. A floating mattress came my way and I grabbed it. Someone on the tanker threw me a life preserver on a line and pulled me aboard. I wish I hadn't been saved. Everything I have is gone. Why couldn't I have died, too?"