THROUGH THE FOG

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 172, 23 July 1942, Page 3

THROUGH THE FOG

STEERING BY INSTINCT

REAL SEAMANSHIP

(By F.N.R.)

The 8.30 passengers gathered at the Bayswater wharf and gazed stoically out into the fog. It was thick and impenetrable.

The boat was already 20 minutes late, but she'd get here—she always got here.

There's no one more sophisticated than your regular ferry passengers —no matter how innocent they may be of the pitfalls and dangers ashore, they are at home on their ferry boat. They know her moods and her capabilities; f they know just where to sit under varying weather conditions; they know her skipper, and the man who lassoes the posts and blows the whistle.

Silently the crowd peers out into the pall of fog. From the damp distance came the first clanging of a bell, and the hoarse hooting of invisible ferry boats coming and going to their various destinations.

Somewhere out there, they all know, their ferry boat is creeping cautiously in, following the line of posts which mark the narrow channel between mudbanks. The skipper can't take risks here—a few yards one way or the other and he'd be piled up on the mud. A mild ripple of animation runs through the crowd. Here she comes! Sure enough a ghostly shape is materialising from the dense fog little more than a chain away. "Blinker" Reached

Another string of buses has just deposited their 9 o'clock human cargo which streams aboard in the wake of the 8.30 crowd, and within a couple of minutes we're off again creeping slowly, cautiously along that line of guiding posts. We've now reached the last outpost, on the edge of the harbour channel—known as the "blinker" in recognition of a feeble red light which blinks wanly at us as we pass, and in a few moments is swallowed up in the fog which is becoming denser than ever. How on earth the skipper finds that feeble guiding mark on his return journey is surely one of the unsolved mysteries of the sea. One may be a landlubber, but it's hard to understand why some responsible authority doesn't put a bell or some sort of an automatic sound signal on a place like that. Dead ahead suddenly looms the shape of a boat crossing our bows from starboard to port. No sooner is it safely across than it swings out away from us then round again and crosses back whence it came. Hoots and Toots We are now in the channel with the fog so thick that one can't clearly see from one end of the ship to the other, and hoots and toots from various points of the compass announce the proximity of other ferries. The sophisticated regular passengers are posed calmly in a solid mass facing the gangway ready for a good get-away when the boat is docked. They obviously take their safe arrival for granted. Their experienced faith in the skipper's unerring ability to find his way home even through this "soup" is interesting. One is moved to go "forrard" and see what's going on. The forward deck from the wheelhouse is roped off, and the skipper's assistant, Bill, is draped over the bowpost like a heroic carved figure of windjammer days, on the lookout. We are presumably nearing the wharves, and travelling slowly. The skipper is apparently steering by a combination of compass, memory and instinct—because visibility is almost nil beyond a few yards, and there's not a bell signal anywhere ahead to guide him. "Queen's wharf over the port bow," hoots Bill In seamanlike fashion, and the skipper wears her away a few points to starboard. Evidently he intends to creep in close to Prince's wharf. "Ebb tide," briefly explains a sophisticated passenger — "has to . allow for the tide at this slow pace." : Sonnds of Prince's Wharf 1 Sounds of workmen's hammers • close over the starboard bow indicate ! that Princcr, wharf must be within > an easy stone-throw, and sure j enough, there overhead suddenly . dimly looms a gigantic crane grotesquely magnified by the fog. It seems extraordinary that we have, in these circumstances to rely on purely adventitious noise of workmen's hammers to guide us into dock. Why not some properly established sound signal on the end of each wharf for such emergencies as this? Anyhow the skipper and the everhelpful Bill eased her in, and we all landed safely. Seamanship is by no means a lost art, even in running harbour ferry boats.