SAGAS OF THE SEA

New Zealand Listener, Volume 28, Issue 713, 13 March 1953, Page 6

SAGAS OF THE SEA

ber 13. A concession is made to navigating . officers, of course, but outside the chartroom the offensive figure is discreetly hidden, or totally ignored. In Her Majesty’s ships the numerical system makes an unseamanlike jump from 12 to 14. In the ships of commerce many a startled landlubber has found that the cabin sandwiched between 12 and 14 is not-oh, dear no!-not 13, but 12A. The reasons for all this are as enigmatic as the fact that a whaler steers a straight course: with three oars on one side and: two on the other, but the number 13 nevertheless has an economy. For seamen it fills the same purpose as the Air Force’s ubiquitous gremlin. If something goes wrong there’s bound to be a 13 about somewhere-if only one looks hard enough, Consider, then, the Hororata. She was launched on the 13th. she began her \" sea, nobody wants the num-

maiden voyage on the 13th. It was somehow inevitable she should be torpedoed | off the Azores at 3.30 p.m. on MH ecember 13, 1942. The Hororata’s story, up to her encounter with the U-boat and after, forms the first two episodes of Sagas of the Sea, a new feature scheduled to begin from ZB stations within the next two months. Station 1ZB, Auckland, will begin the series first, and at the same time add to the Hororata’s numerical story, by broadcasting the first episode (all going well!) this Friday, March 13. Lest the reader conclude that a case is being made for the malignancy of the number 13, let it be said at the outset that the Hororata was a very lucky ship. The torpedo tore two holes-one 23ft. by 21ft., the other six by threein two of the after holds. A third hold aft was left intact, providing sufficient buoyancy to keep the vessel afloat. There were no casualties, and the engines and steering gear were undamaged. The ship was able to reach the Azores port of Flores in little more than 12. hours. Behind her she left a telltale trail of butter and _ debris, washed from the gaping breeches in her side, but she was not again troubled by U-beats. Unstable because of the flooded holds ‘and the loss of some of her cargo, she was yet able to navigate in heavy

seas without capsizing. Luck was with her and ood seamanship did the rest. On December 14, at 7.0 a.m., she came to anchor at Flores. The little port of Flores, did not, however, represent safety. © There were no facilities for the ship’s repair, and a rising gale made hef position so dangerous the entire ship’s company were forced to abandon her for the night. Next day some of the crew feturned and the vessel was trimmed by the filling of one of her fuel tanks and the transfer of oil from others. Again the gale rose. Four of the ship’s boats left ashore were destroyed by the seas. The Hororata herself dragged anchor for 20 miles. But the stout ship obstinately remained afloat. Next night, with a skeleton crew aboard, she slipped out of her anchorage and made for Horta, on the meighbouring island of Fayal, where there was better shelter and more adequate facilities for repairs. She

covered the 150 miles to Horta safely at a speed of 12 knots. At Horta the real story of the Hororata’s salvage began. Repair facilities were meagre. Steel was short: But there was timber. Teams of Portuguese labourers hacked pine wood from the slopes of Fayal’s 3300ft. extinct volcano,

. -aa---l Gorda, and oxen hauled it’ to the port. There it was hewn into the appropriate shapes to fit the great, buckled rents in the ship’s side, and finally with the aid of divers, bolted into place. Followed the difficult task of pumping the flooded _ holds and the nauseating labour of removing thousands of carcases' of rotting mutton and lamb. Then the patch was reinforced with a layer of

concrete three feet thick-320 ‘tons in all-and finally, on March 10,°1943, the Hororata was ready for ‘sea. It was nearly-but not quite--13 weeks since the torpedo struck. On March 17. the ship the German radio had claimed as a» U-boat victory sailed for England under the escort of H.M.S. Burwell, a former U.S. destroyer, This particular saga of the sea ended at Liverpool, where the Hororata discharged undamaged some 10,000 ‘tons of her original 11,300 tons: of cargo. Across the Mersey at Birkenhead she was permanently repaired before returning to a comparatively uneventful service for the remainder of the war. Other early episodes of Sagas of the Sea concern the Britannia and the epic 23-day open-boat voyage that followed her sinking bya raider; the Turakina’s gallant engagement of the raider Orion in the Tasman Sea; and the salvage of, the Volturno, an immigrant ship which, caught fire in mid-Atlantic in 1913. _ The stories are written by Charles Clarke-Smith and produced .by . Pat ,Smyth at Auckland. The. narrator is ‘Peter Gwynn. The series plays on Fri-. days at 8.30 p.m., beginning from 1ZB on March 13, from 2ZB on March 27, from 3ZB on April 17, and from 4ZB on May 1. ;