A PITIFUL ACCIDENT.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 203, 7 May 1912, Page 8

A PITIFUL ACCIDENT.

HOW A SUBMARINE AND CREW ; WERE LOST. A story as plain as print was revealed when the submarine A3, which had been sunk a few weeks earlier off the Isle of Wight, was raised last month and examined. While the A3 was engaged in attacking operations against H.M.S. Hazard, she collided with that vessel, and went down like a stone. She could attack the Hazard from anywhere between 400 and 900 yards, it not being necessary to be closer, and it was her duty to look out for the Hazard, not the Hazard's duty to keep clear of her. ■ It is impossible to follow a submarine's movement accurately, and in •such operations it has to look out for itself. When the shell of the sunken vessel was opened, Lieutenant Ormand, her commander, was found standing by to fire the port torpedo. It was clear from the machinery that steps had been taken to rise and go astern. Those on board had suddenly found that the Hazard was much closer to them than they had believed, and the commander, on the instant, did the right thing. But luck wa9 against him—a trifle interposed and caused the death of 14 men. The moment the propeller began to reverse, it struck a large block of submerged wood. The screw made one hard cut into the wood, and then jambed. Next instant the submarine struck the port propeller shaft of the Hazard. Both propellers hit her, and it was the Hazard's rudder that caused the great rent which sank her like a stone. The submarine only just caught the gunboat's stern. If the propeller had worked astern she would have missed it. When the submarine was raised, the block was still jambed tightly by the propeller. A wrist-watch carried by one of the drowned officers had stopped at 10.53, which was the exact time recorded for the collision in the Hazard's log. No one was to blame; it was just a piece of ill-luck, one of those flicks of fate that make one regard her as a blind goddess.