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Schooner crew cheer rescuers

PA Wellington Sixteen survivors of the sunken schooner Sofia lined a Wellington wharf yesterday and / raised three hearty cheers for .the crew of a Russian refrigerated transporter who rescued them after a five-day ordeal at sea. But their relief was tempered by the knowledge that one of their number, an Auckland girl, died when the 37m topsail schooner was crushed by two huge waves off the northern coast of New Zealand on Tuesday morning. She was Julie Osborne, aged 20, who

had joined, the crew, five days earlier in New Plymouth. Recounting the scramble when the schooner went down, her skipper, Captain Evan Logan said: “We all came up in about the same place, along with the life rafts. It was a stroke of luck. “When I came up, my first reaction was to get a breath of air. The ship was on her beam ends and the masts were in the water. “I went under and when I came up again she had righted herself underwater

and her masts were pointing up. “We scrambled into the rafts and took a head count. That is when we realised Julie was missing. We called out to her but we heard nothing.” During the night the Sofia went down, the wind rose from force three to a force eight gale and Captain Logan first sensed trouble when he discovered during a routine check that there was more water in the bilges than expected. “We had been having trouble with one of the bilge pumps, wbich we always

work in rough weather,” he said. “We couldn’t keep it primed. “Wooden boats always leak in heavy weather, but when I went to check the bilges, there was a lot more water than I expected.” The water was a problem, but it was not alarming, and up until the sail : change minutes before the Sofia foundered, all functions were normal, he said. “Ships get a feel about them, and the Sofia was feeling a little heavy, so I ordered a sail change,” he said. “It was a normal operation until about five minutes

from the end. Then I knew we were in trouble. “A big wave crashed over the bows and broke one of the new liferafts loose. I was just moving to secure it when the second hit us. The lee scuppers were under water and we went over.” Trapped in the Sofia was an emergency locator beacon which would, have guided aircraft and shipping to the survivors. “One of the crew tried to go back for it, but there wasn’t time,” Captain Logan said. The Sofia was carrying 11 New Zealanders, five Ameri-

cans, and one Briton. The crew consisted of 14 jointowners and- three “hitchhikers,” all New Zealanders. The New Zealanders include Trevor Cozens, aged 26, Rodney Straight, aged 28, Bart Willems, Mark Lutterman, aged 24, Scott Reed, aged 20, and Nigel Pollitt, all from Nelson. The survivors, many of them dressed in- clothes given them by their rescuers, were, met by marine police for questioning when the Russian transporter Vasili Perov berthed at Wellington.

Although suffering , from dehydration, exposure, and a few minor sores and cuts, they looked fit and tanned. 'Captain Logan said that during their five days and nights on. the water, four fishing boats and two commercial vessels passed them by. One was a “storeys-high” tanker. / “We used our-last .parachute flare on it, but it just didn’t see us,” he said. On the third day, they saw Cape Reinga and paddled towards it. However.tide and wind turned against them and. swept them out) to sea again.: The skipper of the Russian ship, Captain. Leonid Ochinikov, said yesterday that the 16 survivors had bad im-

mediate attention from the ships doctor.

A bottle of vodka was issued .to them to' steady their nerves, Captain Ochinnikov said.

He had ordered full speed ahead to make Wellington one day early. Mr Trevor Cozens, a Nelson boatbuilder, said the survivors squabbled several times over space on their two tiny liferafts. The liferafts were “just a melee of arms and legs,” he said.

“We had turns at stretching out during the five days but most of the time we just had. to squat. There were a few squabbles when someone moved a little bit and another person took a bit of their space and when a foot or arm got stuck in someone’s .face.” .... On the first day one girl

climbed into the sea to stretch out and relieve herself, but after sharks were, spotted three times and a whale — “a big gray sod spouting away a couple of hundred yards from us” — no one wanted to get into the water again.

“A ship of dreams” is how a Christchurch man described the Sofia.

Mr Sandy Fairservice, a freelance journalist spent a day on the schooner when it was in Nelson in January, interviewing the captain and crew for a "Reader’s Digest” article. He described the Sofia as a “beautiful, graceful craft,” and the chance to sail from port to port as a “romantic experience” for those on board.

“I feel very sorry for the crew because it is the end of their dreams," he said.

“While they worked together and while the ship was viable, it was a very attractive dream for the young and single who had no responsibilities.”

Mr Fairservice was among about 20 people invited on board in Nelson for a day’s sailing in Tasman Bay.

He said that the schooner was 61 years old, with a twocylinder, semi-diesel engirie. She had accommodation for 16. :■

“She was an old boat, and wherever the crew went, they had to keep oh restoring her,” he said. “They would sail from port to port and then fix something.else up.”

Mr Fairservice said the crew had told him that instead of getting weaker, the boat was getting stronger as its journey progressed.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19820302.2.7

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Press, 2 March 1982, Page 1

Word count
Tapeke kupu
983

Schooner crew cheer rescuers Press, 2 March 1982, Page 1

Schooner crew cheer rescuers Press, 2 March 1982, Page 1

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