FIERCE GALE SWEEPS AUCKLAND HARBOUR

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 210, 29 April 1932, Page 5

FIERCE GALE SWEEPS AUCKLAND HARBOUR

(Press Assn.-

HAVOC AMONG YACHTS THREE BOATS POUNDED TO MATCHWOOD ON ROCKS SEVERAL LIVES ENDANGERED

-By Telegraph— Cop> right.)

AUCKLAND, Thursday. Two yachts and a large launch were pounded to pieces in a fierce easterly gale which struck Auckland this morning. A number of other boats came ashore and were damaged. Telephone communication with the North was disorganised and all work on the waterfront was inter- . rupted. At times the wind blew with great fury and the sea in the harbour was the stormiest experienced for severel years. =■ Disaster came to the crack star class yacht June soon after daybreak. The boat, which was owned by Mr. A. W. Tamlin, rear-commodore of the Devonport Yacht Club, slipped her moorings and piled up on the rocks of King Edward Parade, Devonport. Nothing could he done to save her and within an hour she was badly shattered. About 8 o'clock the yacht began to hreak up and she was soon a total wreck. The mast was the only thing saved. The parting of her mooring chain was also responsible for the keel yacht Iris coming ashore on the Waterfront Road breastwork. As the tide rose, the seas continued to break over the yacht which soon became littered with seaweed. At every blow the boat would shudder and pound against the rocks, and at midday she broke up completely. A large fishing launch owned by Mr. J. Lowe, of Kohimarama, hrolce away from her moorning off Kohimarama and came ashore at the eastern end of Mission Bay. Apparently the launch passed underneath the Kohimarama wharf. Pounded hy heavy seas she soon broke up and early this afternoon all that was left of her was a large pile of broken planking. There was no sign of her engine. This is the second launch Mr. Lowe has lost in a storm, Several Boats Damaged When the tide turned there was a heavy sea running in Mission Bay and several small craft were heing hard put to it to ride out the storm. A number of other small craft got into diffieulties. A keel yacht came ashore on the beach at St. Mary's Bay and a large launch was slightly damaged and is leaking at Bayswater. A small yacht got into danger under the Ponsonby wharf. Over at Devonport a number of boats other than the June, which was smashed to match wood, were considex-ably damaged. The 18-footer, Doris, turned trutle and her decking was washed away. A report that a dinghy containing two men had capsized near the eastern side of the tide deflector was received hy the Harbour-master, Captain H. H. Sergent, shortly after 10 o'clock. A launch was despatched to the rescue and the men were picked' up. A store launch belonging to the H.M.S. Philomel broke her moornings shortly after midnight. She was picked up off Stanley Point, and towed to safety by the training ship's pinnace. Two men in a small launch, which broke away from Orakei at daybreak, narrowly escaped hemg shipwrecked. The engine had broken down and the launch was rapidly heing carried toward the eastern tide deflector. Fortunately, the plight of the men was noticed. When a tow boat took the drifting launch in charge, she was dangerously near the rocks. The two men said they had given up all hope of the launch heing picked up before she struck.