SAILING SHIPS

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 35, 11 February 1933, Page 13

SAILING SHIPS

THREE AT AUCKLAND

JHE MAGDALENE yiNNEN

There are at present three barques at Auckland, the Winterhude, the Passat, and the Magdalene Vinnen.

The Magdalene Vinnen is the largest sailing ship afloat. The "Auckland Star" states that according to every member of the ship's company she is the finest vessel afloat ana the fastest. She has logged Between 14 and 15 knots, and made a fast trip of 89 days between Gibraltar and Auckland. The barque brought a cargo of cork from Spain. She is fitted with 500 h.p. Diesel engines, so that she need never be becalmed, but the master, Captain L. Peters, said that on the trip out the engines were used perhaps on 10 days in all; "We used them in the doldrums and when entering harbours and rivers," he explained, "and for the rest we relied on sail. The oia lady does not like berthing, but there is nothing wrong with her in the open sea. She did between 14 and 15 knots without the aid of the engines." One of the youngest sailing ships, she has the distinction also of being the largest afloat. She is 100 metres long or 328 ft, 15 metres or 50ft in beam' and her draught is 25ft. Her displacement is 3467.t0n5, while her cargo eapacityis 5200 tons. Being built only in 1921, naturally everything in her is modem. She is fitted with electric light, and every convenience. Her builders are the well-known, firm of Krupps, and she was laid dowrn in Kiel," Germany., She was especially' built for bulk cargoes, such as grain, and fitted with steel shifting boards, so that the cargo cannot shift. Her ballast is carried in a double bottom, and she requires 1700 tons of it.

4600 SQUARE YA&DS OP CANVAS.

Perhaps the first feeling one has after climbing aboard is that of being low down and looking high up. On. a steamer, of course, it is the other way round; but on the Magdalene Vinnen the masts tower away up. With all sails set, she carries 4600 square yards of canvas. The Passat. carries 4477 square yards. The Magdalene Vinnen's masts, all of steel, soar 193 feet from the main deck, and her great main yard, also of steel, is over 70 feet long. ..••-.•.'

The Magdalene Vinnen will bo placed in the Calliope <Dock on Monday, and nvill be undocked on Tuesday, sailing on that day for Australia to load for the Continent. , .