A CLOSE CALL

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2353, 8 January 1915, Page 7

A CLOSE CALL

DROWNING ACCIDENT NARROWLY ' ■ ■ t AVERTED. Two • membors of, the Coast Defence Force stationed •at Fort' Ballanoe, Messrs. Hoare and Garruthers, had a narrow, escape; from , drowning in the entrance to the harbour, off Karaka Bay, late, yesterday afternoon. They -i were returning: from a j sailing crui6e to , Rona Bay in an open boat, when a ■ sudden ■ squall • struck the little craft, upset it, and precipitated its ocbupiints. •into the water about a 1 mile off the Karaka Bay wharf. Fortunately both men conld swim, and still more fdrtimately their, plight was observed' from - the shore. iTwo boys named Brodie and Doughty at once put off from the Karaka Bay .wharf in; a dinghy, and pulled as hard as they could in the rather, nasty sea that was running in tho entrance, and soon.after them, a larger boat with three Coast Defence .men, Messrs.vP; Wolland, Cecil Duck, and Smith, also put off to effect a lescuo. The first boat aririved none too soon. The two : men were found in '■ an exhausted oondition, dinging to the. upturned boat. Both men were picked Tip by the plucky boys-mentioned, after being about twenty-five minutes in the . water, _ and .as the dinghy. was rather ! overweighted, i one was\transferred to • the Coast Defence boat. They were 1 brought in to the Karaka Bay wharf 1 and taken to the residence of -Mrs.. 1 Wootan, who had observed the acci- •< dent and had made all .preparation for ' reviving the thoroughly nnmbed and i exhausted men, who admitted that they < could not have held oil to the submerged ! > boat mnch longer.V Had the accident c occurred a little'farther out or had the capsizing of the boat not been-observed 1 from the shore, there would probably i have been a fatality to. record. Praise t is due to the plucky lads who grasped the situation so quickly and acted with j such promptitude. ]