76 DAYS ADRIFT

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 714, 13 July 1929, Page 10

76 DAYS ADRIFT

ORDEAL IN OPEN BOAT STARVATION AND THIRST A thrilling sea adventure in which a gallant sailor and his companions struggled vainly against pursuing illluck and ended by drifting about the Atlantic for many days without food or water, is being related. In February of last year Captain Sckutteyaer, a Dutch shipmaster, set out from Holland in a vessel of his own invention. It was an elastic, non-eapsizable lifeboat which he claimed could not be sunk. To prove this claim he proposed to Cross the Atlantic in it. Captain Schutteyaer reached London without mishap, and those who saw the little vessel there found it full of interest. It has a keel that can be filled with fresh water to ensure many days’ supply, and at the same time increase stability. The inventor claims that it cannot be upset. even in the heaviest seas, and the protected sides which are covered with a pliable, basket-like material, prevent the boat from being stove in when launched alongside a ship in heavy weather. Leaving London with a crew of three, the boat ran into a gale in the Knglish Channel. Her sails were blown away and only with great difficulty did the little vessel make Plymouth. There she was held up for months, until new sails and provisions were obtained, and it was not until January 3 this year that the old shipmaster and his two companions set out again on their great adventure.

111-fortune, however, still followed the gallant little graft, and although she behaved well, the heavy seas and strong winds prevented a call being made at Lisbon and the Western Islands, where it was intended to put in on the way to New York. • The boat had provisions and water on board for 65 days. The lonely navigators, try as they would to make a course to Lisbon, could not do so. I-lead winds met them at every attempt and blew them wide of the Bay of Biscay. Then they headed south, hoping to meet more favourable weather, but again they were disappointed, the sea and currents carrying them always out of their course. Then provisions began to get short Food had to be rationed sparingly, and water tanks became lower and lower. No ship was seen to render assistance. Day after day the gallant navigators scanned the horizon for the sight of a friendly vessel. Then the water and provisions gave out entirely and for a week they had nothing to eat or drink. Drifting helplessly and in a state of utter collapse, thej T were at last sighted by a Spanish steamer, on her way to South America. They had been 76 days in an open boat on the high seas, and so cramped and exhausted were the men that they had to be hauled on board. But they had proved one thing—their boat stood up to every kind of weather experienced. She was intact and undamaged when hoisted on board the Spanish steamer 400 miles west of the Canary Islands.