EXTRAORDINARY PHENOMENA.

Southland Times, Issue 1005, 17 August 1868, Page 2

EXTRAORDINARY PHENOMENA.

A series of most extraordinary phenomena occurred in the New Biver estuary on Saturday last. During the forenoon the water was obse**ved to rise and fall three distinct times, sometimes with the almost imperceptible ebb and flow of an ordinary tide, but oh other occasions with alarming and startling rapidity. The tide, which was ebbing, seemed suddenly to turn, and rose quickly for several feet, then changed as sud--denly, and in a few minutes receded a distance of, in some instances, ten chains. A boatman in coming up the harbor narrowly escaped being capsized by a tidal wave, some two or three feet high, which rose at a little distance, advanced with fearful velocity, and caught his craft in its course. The same extraordinary tidal disturbances were also experienced at the Bluff and at Biverton. Our telegraphic intelligence shows that the same oceanic convulsions, in a still greater degree, had been felt all up the East Coast of the Middle Island, and at "Wellington. The probability is that they have been general along the eastern coast line of the whole J country, from the Three Kings to Stewart's ! Island. So far as is yet known, the tidal wave seems to have been most intense in the vicinity of Port Lyttelton, Oamaru, and Timaru. "We have had several instances brought to our notice of the extraordinary effects produced by this disturbance of the laws of nature. Boats loading and unloading at different ; places on the margin ofthe New Biver were I suddenly turned round as if by a ' whirlpool, and then, the water quickly re- ; ceding, were left high and dry. Our I Campbeltown correspondent speaking of what has been observed at the Bluff says— During the last two or three days we have had indications of there having been a severe gale from the South East, somewere not far off. However, we have had but a light breeze from that quarter, but the most remarkable indication we have had, occurred this morning, (Saturday) with the flood tide, which came in with such rapidity that it was calculated to be running ten knots an hour, bringing in a great quantity of kelp, which got enentangled with the moorings of the buoys in the harbor, and several of them have dragged considerably away from their proper positions. Fortunately, the Government punt, which has for some time back been having an overhaul on the beach, was launched yesterday, and in a day or two the " runaway buoys " may be found in their proper places again.