Congestion At Lyttelton Again Threatened

Press, Volume C, Issue 29511, 12 May 1961, Page 12

Congestion At Lyttelton Again Threatened

After a lull of several weeks, shipping congestion is again threatened at Lyttelton.

There has been an increased shortage of labour for vessels in the test day or two, and several more ships are expected to berth today According to Mr W F. Sillars. secretary of the New Zealand Port Employers’ Association at Lyttelton, the general outlook indicates that congestion may be serious. Work on the waterfront began at 10 am. yesterday after the usual monthly stopwork meeting of the Watersiders' Union, but was stopped by rain shortly before 3 pm One coastal vessel, the Breeze, lay idle all day yesterday as a result of the labour shortage, and others were short manned. Among those affected were the Holmbum, which should have sailed for Wellington las’ evening after discharge of tH cattle from the Chatham Islands and loading for Weii.ngton.

The newly-arrived

ship. Port Dunedin, which is loading for United Kingdom and Continental ports, was also short manned, as was the British freighter. Mystic, loading for Dunkirk. London and Hull.

The Swedish passenger, freighter. Cumulus, now discharging Continental cargo, was manned by her own crew

Apart from the arrival of the Port Melbourne, which was fortunate enough to find a berth last evening, the Union Company's Kaituna. which was du? late last evening, and the Komata, Waimea, and Konini, which are due today, will all have to anchor. In addition, the British cargo-liner. Sussex la also due today, and the Eastern trader. Eastern Argosy, is due in harbour late this evening.

The anticipated arrival of two Japanese freighters, the Kowa Maru and Susei Maru. 'he British freighter Galway and the Norwegian snip. Simara. all on Saturday, will add to the threatened problem of congestion, accentuated yesterday by the rairfl|