Poverty Bay Standard. Published Every Evening. GISBORNE : WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1882.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1213, 29 November 1882, Page 2

Poverty Bay Standard. Published Every Evening. GISBORNE : WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1882.

No tiGiiT has yet been thrown upon the cause of the kite accident to the Orient steamer Austral. We still cling to our belief that it will be found that she has started a plate or two somewhere. Four hundred tons of ballast would make very little difference to a ship of her size in a safe and quiet anchorage, certainly not sufficient, we should think, to bring her coaling ports, which are on the main deck, on a level with the water. The accounts in the Australian papers arc singularly meagre respecting this casualty. In the “New Zealand Herald " it is taken for granted that the water tanks are underneath the coaldninkern, Now this we very much doubt. If we are not misinformed the Austral’s bunkers would go down on to the floor of the bilge. Besides, in a vessel of over 4000 tons, this would make little difference toiler stability when at anchor; and when the “Herald” professes to have discovered the secret in the few lines “there was no water in any of the boilers,” that journal certainly shews that it has mistaken the case. The tact of her not

having her ballast in would not in our opinion affect her at an anchorage such as she was in, and to get her coaling ports down to the water’s edge would require a leverage force far beyond a few hundreds of tons. v At sea she would roll considerably from being light, i but we guarantee that she could go home “flying light” without danger. No; the truth we think must lay in something more feasible than this cock and bull yarn about ballast, and ports, and capsizing. She has filled from the bottom, foundered, and depend upon it when the divers get under the bilge they will find this to be the case. Captain Murdoch is most unlikely a man to jeopardise any ship for the want of a few hundred tons of ballast; a more careful master, or a better seaman, never trod a plank, and his professional knowledge would tell him whether the ship was likely to be in any danger from the fact of her being light. We quite agree with the concluding paragraph of Mr. Hird’s letter as expressed in the “Herald" yesterday, viz.: “Many people quite believe that when the Austral is raised a different theory to the one now prevalent as to the cause of the disaster gwill be established ; and it will be found that the bulk of the passengers, by her foundering at her moorings, escaped what would have happened to her had she gone to sea.” With this opinion we most "thoroughly coincide. There can be no doubt that Capt. Murdoch’s words ; “ If all the tanks had been full that would have given the vessel greater stability” are true ; but we imagine those words mean simply “ Yes,” in reply to the enquiry, “ Would such be the case.” We hold that a vessel of her dimensions, having on board her engines, crew and provisions, is as safe coaling in a snug little Bay, such as she was lying in, as she would be'in a dry dock, unless she starts something. If her coaling ports were brought to the water’s level some one wufjf inevitably have noticed, if, because it would be done by degrees, and she would attain a list that could not possibly escape serious attention. We shall look anxiously forward to the accounts that will doubtless shortly reach us of the real cause of the accident, and shall be very much astonished if it is found that she is sound underneath. The Austral is, or was, the finest merchant ship afloat, and her foundering in this extraordinary manner cannot fail to cause much discussion in shipping circles.