MARINE INQUIRY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 295, 8 December 1908, Page 2

MARINE INQUIRY.

THE WAIKUXA-MINTARO COLhISIOs. THE COURT'S FUNDING. Received 7, 10.5 p.m. Sydney, Monday

la the Vice-Admiralty Court judgment was delivered in the cases arising out of the Wairuna-Minturo collision on 7th October, both parties claiming £OOOO. The Judge said that a mistake had been made on hoard the Mintaro by not keeping u proper lookout. The captain, by exercising ordinary care, could have, avoided any risk of collision, and therefore thought his negligence one of the proximate causes of the accident. He was further of opinion that the captain of the .Wairunu was guilty of neglect in omitting to take such reasonable precautions as the circumstances of the case required, and witch to some extent were the cause of the collision. He should have taken more than usual precautions to warn vessels coming up behind him. Had these precautions, which were no more than were required by the exercise of ordinary care, been observed, the collision could have been avoided. He should have kept a proper lookout astern. He held both vessels to blame, and the party whose vessel sustained the smaller damage would have to pay to the other the balance of the moiety of his own loss and the moiety of the loss of the other, the parties to pay their own costs.