MARINE CASUALTIES.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 804, 29 April 1910, Page 5

MARINE CASUALTIES.

SATARA INQUIRY. CAPTAIN CALLED ON TO SHOW CAUSE. ' POSITION OP THE PILOT. 3y Telesraph—tress Association—Oopyrleht (Eec. April 28, 9.40 p:m.) Sydney, April 28. At the marine inquiry into the loss of the British India Steam Navigation Company's : steel screw steamer Satara, .5272 tons gross (which foundered off the Seal Eocks, about.ss miles north of Newcastle, without loss of life), the master, Captain Hugill, stated that after the steamer struck he took bearings which put the vessel about a quarter of a mile northeast of the Edith breaker. Captain Binstead, the pilot, stated that he hud taken large vessels through tho inner passage—between the Seal Eocks and the mainland—many times. Tho object was to get' out of the southern cur. rent and to gain ahout five miles in tho run between Newcastle and the Queensland coast, the steamer being bound to Singapore. Shortly before she struck.the ship was heading between Peak Eock and Seal Books. If she had struck the Edith breaker, Peak Eock would have boon straight ahead; instead of that, it was. consilerably oh the port bow. Witness was satisfied that' ho was clear of the Edith breaker. '.He admitted that hia pilot's license did not; authorise him to take charge of vessels outside Queensland waters, but it had been customary for Torres Straits pilots "to take charge of ships before getting into their own waters, so that they might ascertain compass deviations and discover how the vessels acted.'- . „ The captain of a small coasting* steamer said he knew of a submerged uncharted rock, surrounded by deep water, eastward of the Edith breaker. . The. Court found that the loss of the? Satara was caused by the wrongful act of Captain Hugill by allowing a course to be set which caused her to strike tho Edith breaker, and called on Captain Hugill to show cause-why his 'certificate should not be dealt with. '

THE EDITH BREAKER. ' The Satara was bound from Newcastle, via Queensland and Torres Straits, •' to Singapore and India. Captain Binstead is described in the Sydney papers as a Torres Strait pilot. ' _ The Edith Breaker, where the Satara is alleged to havo .come .to grief, lies directly on the line of the track of. coasting vessels when passing between Seal Kocks and' the mainland. It has 25ft. of water, on it at low water, with from 18 to 20 fathoms immediately around, and with any swell forms a dangerous breaker. The seas were moderate at time of the disaster, and.the wind was from the SSE. The shoal is situated about 2\ miles from the .large Seal.Bock. ,'Captain C. Hugill, the master of the Satara, is one of the senior commanders in the employ of the British India Steam Navigation Company, and during his long seafaring career has commanded many of the finest liners in-the fleet. .iHe is extremely popular with his officers and'men, and.' is held in high esteem in the' shipping circles of the Commonwealth. Captain Hugill, whose home is in England, has always been regarded as an exceptionally' careful navigator.-' The Satara was launched in December, 1901, from the shipbuilding yards of Messrs. W. Denny, and Bros., at Dumbarton, to the' order of the British India Steam Navigation Company, Limited, and has since been very successfully employed in the trade wjth India and Australia. She was a steel screw steamer of 5272 tons gross, and of 3409-tons net, her principal dimensions- being: Length, 410 ft. Bin.; breadth,. 50ft. :,7in.; and depth, 29ft.. '. ' She was electrically lighted throughout, and was an up-to-date vessel in every* department. ' She was .'especially fitted for the carriage of horses, and during'her career carried many thousands of Australian horses for military remounts in . The maohinery of the lost.vessel consisted of a set of engines of.the tripleexpansion type, manufactured by the builders of the hull, the diameters of the cylinders being 26J inches by 42 inches and 661 inches respectively, with a stroke of 51 inches! Her nominal horse-power was 383.. The lascar crew behaved very well. ■When the castaways explaining matters on the Sydney Wharf, an engineer with a Glasgow voice chimed in: "Those niggers over there behaved splendidly." The "niggers" in question were then being marshalled on the wharf. They looked a' curious crowd, clothed mostly in.'sarongs and dungarees. There were •■ 16 "boys"- in the saloon who came from Goa, and 62 lascars from Calcutta,'employed as deck and engine-room hands and firemen, i Amedali, the serang, spoke English. "We all right. No one sink.' Two lascars in th« water picked up by other boat." .''• OVERDUE. ANOTHER BRITISH INDIA BOAT. London, April 27. Advices from Cape Town state that the British India Steam; Navigation Company's steel screw-steamer Carpentaria, 5766 tons gross, built in 1904, is overdue at Cape Town from Natal. ~' '

COMPANY ITS OWN INSURERS. The British India Steam Navigation Company, whose. 5000-ton liner ' Satara (valued at £100,000 to £150,000) foundered off tho Seal Rocks, and whose 5000-ton liner Carpentaria is overdue on the same South African run as the Waratah was lost on, does its insuring. It has always been the custom of the company to underwrite its own vessels, and there is a Mibstantial fund to.meet disasters to vessels of the fleet. The Satara's cargo of coal, valued at about £7000, was shipped en behalf of the owners of the vessel. Insurance companies, therefore, will not buffer by the Satara disaster. In 1855 the founder of the company, the late Sir William MacKinnon, arranged to establish the Calcutta arid Burmah Steam Navigation Company for ' the performance of mail services for the East x udia Company, with which object it was incorporated in 185G, the Baltic and Cape of Good Hope being sent out in 1857 to start the business, in ' 1862 a fresh mail service was entered into which included additional routes, and the name of the company was' officially .altered to its present title—more in keeping with its business, which strikingly benefited from tho opening of the Suez Canal, through which tho company's steamship India conveyed the Awt cargo of Indian pro-, duce. The Aden-Zanzibar mail service was put on in 1872, and from then until now new routes have been constantly added to its' itinerary, the extent o'f which will' not admit of more than a bare outline. The company is under contract with the Home and Indian Governments for mail services to Arabia, Persia, India, Barmah, East India, tho Mauritius, and also runs other services to Batavia, Queensland, etc. In 1899 a three-weekly lino from Calcutta' to Manila was established, which has since been extended tq Yokohama, Kobe, and Moji. This important undertaking, with its far-reach-ing organisation and_ connections, supplies over 100 ports with commercial facilities; it is under the management of Messrs. MacKinnon, MacKcnzle, and Co., in-India; Messrs'. Gray, Dawes, and Co. having represented the company in London sinco 1800.