DECISION RE WRECK OF CITY OF AUCKLAND.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1488, 22 November 1878, Page 3

DECISION RE WRECK OF CITY OF AUCKLAND.

[By telegraph.] ! i’KOM THE COUUKSI’ONDKN'f Or THE rKESS.J Weblinuton, November 21. The official inquiry rc the stranding of the City of Auckland at Otaki was concluded today. The Court delivered a carefully prepared written decision. Mr Mansfield said it was evident from the construction of the Act that the decision of the magistral e alone was the decision of the Court, the nautical assessor merely sit ting with him to guide him in any purely nautical question which might arise. If the nautical assessors differed, the magistrate alone could give a decision, but one of the assessors must agree with him if that decision involved the suspension of the certificate of an officer. The law further provided that one of the assessors must be skilled in the practice of merchant service, and that, he thought, indicated that the magistrate should rather be guided by the pract ice in vogue in the merchant service than by the strict, rule of the Loyal Navy. Tins point would bo taken into consideration m giving the decision. lie was cf opinion that the loss of the City cf Auckland was caused by the position of tae ship being incorrectly ukikid 0 n the chart, this error having ar sen from the captain Inadvertently calculating his distance by (he longitude instead of the latitude scale, which made a variation of fourteen cr fifteen miles. The imperfect, or

inexact information contained in the Admiralty chart not improbably caused Stephen’s Island to have been taken for Kapiti. Supposing the position of the ship had been where the captain thought it was at the lime he marled the chart, his course would bo right, and such as would have been taken by the majority of masters going through Cook’s Straits. The fact that lie did not use the deep-sea lead might bo considered culpable negligence, but from the soundings on the chart it appeared that approximately the same depth of water would be found in the true and false position, and that soundings would not have en abled the captain to determine his actual positiou. The error in the scale could not have occurred in the Royal Navy w-here several officers had to check each other’s calculations ; but it appeared to be the common practice in the merchant service for the master alone to take observations, and it would be unfair to punish a man for merely following what had become the general custom. It might bo advisable to call the attention of the Board of Trade to this practice, that it might be made a rule that masters’ calculations should be chocked by one officer. Being guided by the rules of the merchant service rather than the strict rules of the Royal Navy, and taking into consideration the confidence placed in Captain Rolls by his employers for many years, the implicit negligence of his officers, and his skill and praiseworthy energetic conduct in landing passengers and crew without the loss of a single life, he was of opinion that Capt. Rolls’ certificate should bo returned to him. There was nothing in the conduct of the officers to call for censure, and their certificate would also be returned.