AN ACT OF HEROISM.

Patea Mail, Volume IX, Issue 1091, 26 September 1883, Page 2

AN ACT OF HEROISM.

A Mail Steamer Saved from Destruction. The London papers of July 80 contain particulars of an act of heroism so daring and unique that the story will be read even at the ntterihost parts of the earth with wonder and admiration; —“The steamer Aurania, belonging to the Cunard line, was on her way across the Atlantic when some serious injury befell her crank shaft. A consequence of this disaster Was to convert a portion of the shaft into a gigantic flail of steel weighing many tons. This frightful whip ol metal, wielded by tho engines, revolved at a tremendous speed, and the scene presented in the engine-room baffles description. The result of an injured propeller or a broken shaft is to make the engines ‘race’—that is to say, finding no further steadying resistance in the gyrations of the screw, they go at enormous speed, and furnish the surest indication to the engineers that something is wrong. The ‘racing ’ of the engines of this steamer, communicated a furious movement to the arm of steel just abaft the engine-room, 4 Iron and steel,’ we read, 4 were knocked to pieces. A supporting pillar of wrought iron, a fool in thickness, was broken in two, and one piece weighing a ton was bitten out so to speak.- Right and left this terrific flail was dealing destruction, filling the atmosphere with sparks and smoke from its crashing blows, and raising a deafening uproar. It was very soon understood that if the fearful thrashing movement was not arrested by the stoppage of the engines, the ship’s plates in tho neighbourhood of the whirling body of steel would be ' beaten out, and that she would sink like lead. It so happened, however, that the brake which controlled the vast piece of mechanism was situated within 2ft of the revolving mass. Clouds of scalding steam hid il from view, and the storm of sparks which were thrown up threatened death to any man who approached the spot. The second engineer (a Scotchman, named Andrew described ns a 4 tall, brawny man, of some three or four and thirty,' was on duty in the engine room, Ho was standing at a distance of about 30ft from the brake and instantly perceived that if the ship was to be saved the engines must be stopped. The brake was invisible ; the rush of steam was suffocating ; and the thunderous commotion of the racing engines and the violent crashing sounds of the rotating mass of metal produced a clamor sufficient to daunt the bravest heart. Nevertheless, this heroic man, dropping on his knees, fearlessly crept through the blinding vapour and sparks, feeling his way as he moved, until he was so close to the whirling flail that the wind of it was like a hurricane upon his face ; and then, still groping with his hand, he grasped the brake and stopped the engines. ‘He was badly scalded about the face and hands,’ concludes the account, 4 but otherwise uninjured. He had risked his life to save the ship.’ ”