SYDNEY FERRY DISASTER.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19161, 18 November 1927, Page 6

SYDNEY FERRY DISASTER.

SURVIVOR'S STORY.

DIVERS' GRUESOME TASK. RECOVERING BODIES IN SALOONS. {YROii OUR SYDNEY, November 11. l-'or the past week Sydney, the whole State, the whole of Australia, has been overwhelmed by the terrible ferry disaster on our harbour —the worst in the history of this beautiful port. With a death-roll of nearly fifty and a list of more than fifty injured, the city will long remember with sorrow that tragicNovember afternoon when the outward bound Tahiti rammed and sank the Watson's Bay ferry Greycliffe, carrying people to their homes in Watson's Bay and Vaucluse, The disaster cast gloom into many homes in those two suburbs. The death that came so suddenly to tho Grevcliffe's passengers was no respecter of age, and the victims ranged from a veteran of 81 to a babe of two, and included a number of school childrenThe broad outlines of the tragedy have already been told in New Zealand by lengthy cables and by interviews with the passengers of the Tahiti. It remains for the present writer to recount the personal narrative of one survivor, as typical of many, and also the gruesome, yet noble, work performed by Harbour Trust divers in searching the wrecked Greycliffe on the harbour's bed for the bodies of victims. The personal narrative chosen is that of Stanley C. Whalley, a civilian employed in the naval depot at Garden Island. The Greycliffe had called at Garden Island on her way to Watson's Bay, and there Whalley and a dozen or so other naval depot workers had boarded her. It was after the Greycliffe had left Garden Island a couple of hundred yards astern that the disaster occurred.

Whalley bad taken an outer seat on the port side on boarding the Greycliffe, and from there he could see the Tahiti coming down the harbour from her berth at Walsh Bay. "As a Royal Navy man," said Whalley, "I was interested. I thought to myself what a fine sea boat she looked and how nicely she cut the water. I was tired and the foam looked refreshing. On my right a man and a woman were sitting quietly together. He was reading, a paper and I suppose she, too, was looking at the liner and thinking her own thoughts about it. About ten schoolgirls, young and fresh-looking, were on my left, doing some lessons, others talking, and still others watching a few boys playing pranks near the stern. "When we were near Bradley's Head, the Tahiti would be about 200 yards away. Deckhand Jones came from somewhere for-'ard to collect tickets and it struck me then how fast wo wore being overtaken. I called out to Jones: 'By jove, she's close,' and Jones turned! Then he shouted: 'She's got us.' I stood up. Towering above us and only 12 yards away was the sharp steel bow. The Tahiti looked like a huge monster. The little ferry seemed n thing, so small and puny. The schoolgirls were standing, white-faced and speechless. I could see nothing of the man and woman who had been so quiet, or the boys who had been so rowdy. "Jones called to the girls: 'Come ou. Get clear. Make for the top deck.' The girls rushed inside. 'All on the top deck. We're hit.' I could hear Jones shouting near the engine-room. Then she struck. I have never known anything more horrible than that crash, and the splintering and the dust as the bow hit right into the ferry's side. I was standing up, clinging to the rail. There were screams and shouts inside. God knows how the rest must have felt —those trapped in the cabins! I made my way for-'ard, away from the terrible blow as it continued to grind and shear through the Greycliffe. And as I passed the gangway, I could see the people crowded inside, panic-stricken, calling out things I could not distinguish, and boys and girls, and men and women on the stairways, some trying to go up and others down. "All this was a matter of seconds. Those nearest the starboard side of the ferry were already knee-deep in water, and doomed. Instinctively, avoiding that death trap, I kept out on the port side and clambered further forward. Already the Greycliffe was go far over that as I slid over the bulwark, it was almost horizontal. I scrambled towards the keel and caught a glimpse of the propeller. Then, as the liner cut through the forry tho bow suddenly tilted and dived with me on it. My last glimpse was of another man who had been desperately doing what I was doing. Then the waters came up- The suction dragged me down. I have no idea how far. I had taken a deep breath and was holding it. My lungs were almost bursting. My chest contracted and expanded as in breathing, and the strain was awful, Ever so long it seemed I was under water, and when I came up there alongside of me were the stern of the Tahiti and her motionless propeller. I got away from the great blades, for it shot through my mind that were they to turn I should be hacked to pieces. In all my life I have never swum more than 25 yards. Yet I kept afloat. I had my senses about me still.

"For a few seconds I saw nobody. The man who had scrambled towards the keel with me I never saw again. I found mysejf grasping a small narrow piece of board about three feet long. Whether it was of any use to me I cannot tell. I had it caught under one arm, and with the other arm and my feet I paddled clumsily. I was shouting. I was cursing. I was damning men who had not let the lifeboats down. 'Lower your lifeboats,' I kept shouting. There were other noises around me, human voices, perhaps, like my own. Voices of men and women and little children, more helpless even than I was. Then I saw J ones, the deckhand, again. He was swimming towards part of the roof of the upper deck. As I looked at him, he caught it, and let go to save a girl. He swam to her, and took her to his bit of roof. He did this again and yet again. The last poor girl seemed unconscious, as he laid her in safety. Then he called to me, across the water t 'Are you all right, brother?' I said, 'Yes, Call to them to lower those boats.'

"Alongside me a woman was floating unconscious. She seemed to be supported on something. Her face was ghastly pale, her hat off, her wet hair bedraggled. Sounds were coming from her throat, and I thought th«;v must be her death rattle. When I nest saw her, she was lying on the bottom of a boat, quite still. Then I could see a great bruise on her temple At last a small tug came beside me. It seemed I could hold out no longer. I was cramped with my awkward paddling, and the terrible strain. For two yards I struck out, letting go my little board. A deckhand threw me a line. I ean't tell you what it feels like to miss a line when you are at yom last

The line fell short. But next Fime it dropped within my reach, and I clutched it. Two men hauled me aboard, and 1 collapsed. Through the black story of the disaster run golden threads—the golden threads of heroism, the heroism (as the Premier, Mr Bavin, simply said to the Legislative Assembly) that al- I ways distinguishes great disasters in ill British countries. WhaUey has briefly mentioned the heroic work done bv the deckhand, "Curly" Jones. He rescued at least a dozen persona some of them boys and girls whom he had watched grow from "babes in arms ror ••Curlv" Jones had been on the Watson's 'Bay. run for many years. Then the Tahiti's passengers have told of the magnificent heroism of a fireman on that vessel, Frederick Corby, who leant into the maelstrom of wreckage and saved life after life. Then there was the "girl in green, a heroine whose name is not known, but who was seen bv the signal master at South Head through his telescope to save person after person by diving m from a large raft-like piece_ of wreckage and hauling them on to it. Divers' Great Work. And with the heroes must be ranked Divers Harris and Carr. of the Sydney Harbour Trust's staff. The former went down early the morning after the disaster, and it was only after a long and difficult search that he found the wreck in 70ft of water in thick mud. From here on, let Diver Harris tell his own story: "I felt it must be the Greycliffe. And now I knew that the worst few minutes were coming—-my first glimpse of what was under us. I went down with my mind full of what I had heard—of people who had been trapped, of the people who had been mangled, and especially of the little children. There was no cloud of mud this time, as my feet caine to rest. I was on the top deck of the Greycliffe itself, and four feet from my eyes, dimly visible, was something white—a woman's clothing. All the c' slike a man has for touching and disturbing the dead rose up in me._ The woman was gripped as in a vice. She was pinned down with her face away from me. Across her back was a twisted iron railing and over her leg was another. She had died cruelly, 1 eld like that, As I went towards her, I saw another, and then a third body close bv. Apparently a woman and a girl, j"did not look-closely then, but tugged on my line, signalling for my diver s slate. I wrote: "I "see three bodios. Women. Send me a line and I will send one up.' "Until now I had not seen the face of the trapped woman. But when th? line came down and I began to release her, I saw it, a handsome, attractive face. On her hand I could see the gleam of a wedding ring, and r - her throat a pearl necklace. Except one other, no face I have ever seen in the wreck has made such a vivid impression on my mind. It was the first. I would gladly forget it. but far more gladly the other, of which I have to tell later. When the three bodies nad been sent up, I looked about me. Under me was the Greycliffe's upper deck, but all the super-structure was gone. Where the top saloon had beem there was only scattered debris, and it seemed strange that even three bodies should have remained there. I began to get down off the top deck. I went cautiously over the edge and down, swinging my feet until they touched the rail. I reached the outside of the smoking cabin. Then I went from window to window, and peered in at each in turn. At about the third, I saw, as I thought, a good many bodies huddled together. I put in my hand and touched one, that of a man, and after drawing him half out, sent for the .line once more. At the next window. I saw the big frame of Dr. Reid, lying up towards the roof. It was difficult to get him out. "After I had a spejl on the surface, my mate, Carr, arrived, and we talked things over, and then went down together. I knew one diver could not venture into the cabin without another on the bottom. His lines playing against the beams of the wreck would strain, and there would be no slack to signal with. First, we used a saw to make a hole in the panels between the windows. Then we sent for a tomahawk, which we put up against the panels and hit with a hammer. We cut a hole where we wanted it. I was to go in among the dead. Carr was to look after my lifeline and pipe, signal the surface, and pay out to me as I needed it. As I came out with a body, Carr carefully withdrew my lines to save them from tangling. The cabin was a strange topsy-turvydom- Broken timber and seats had floated to the roof, and even bodies were above me, I must tell of the body that haunts me, it was a little child we found late in the day. Perhaps it is because I have held my own kiddies in ray arms, and have grandchildren, too, that this' hurt so much, A little boy of four, he BeeMed. I turned him so that I could look at his face, so pitifully babyish and innocent. My heart was bursting as I put him in Carr's arms, I saw Oarr look at him, too. We couldn't talk to each other then, but afterwards Carr told me that in all his life he had never felt like that before. All day long we had been fighting back our feelings." That first day of the divers' search yielded 13 bodies. On the next day, Saturday, they again explored ithe wreck, but no more bodies were found. It was discovered that the ladies' saloon had broken away from the main portion, and this could not be found on the Saturday. On Sunday, the bodies of a man and a boy were found in the engine room. In the neighbourhood of the wreck was found the body of a girl lying on her back on the mud bottom, with nothing holding it down. The ladies' saloon was believed to have contained many bodies, but when the divers at last found and explored it, there was none in it. The victims who had been seated in it had apparently been washed out and their bodies are now lying on the harbour floor. This portion of the wreck was raised to the surface on Monday and early the next morning it was towed to a small beach in the harbour and there, resting in shallow water was moored. The work of lifting the other and major portion of the Greycliffe was then proceeded with. On each of the six day following the disaster Divers Hanis and Carr spent from six to eight hours below the surface, and their noble and arduous work won the praise of the whole State. Although they probably looked , upon the work as part of their daily routine, a suggestion that they should be rewarded with a gift from the nation is meeting with hearty approvah