Captain Brown makes home!

From a Noumea correspondent While Caledonians pressed all night against caving plate glass doors and splintering windows, hoping that their roofs would hold and that their boats would not be smashed to pieces, no one imagined that cyclone Colleen could be a boon to anyone.

In fact, the 100 mph winds that swept Noumea on Sunday, February 2, left most of the town two days without electricity and some suburbs up to six days with out water. Landslides which broke pipes at the Dumbea dam forced families to drive to nearby creeks and springs for water, or else wait on the footpath and col lect bucketsful of water from passing water trucks.

Colleen had mercy on only one man, and that was Captain Gor don Brown, of the Matipo, ship wrecked since last May on the reef 40 miles out of Noumea.

For nine months the New Zea land captain had guarded his stricken 398-ton vessel, patiently awaiting various rescue attempts.

The ship has a sturdy hull—built 16 years ago in Holland for ser vice among the icebergs of the Baltic Sea.

At low tide it was perched in only one foot of water, which permitted Captain Brown to descend from his solitude and in vestigate the marine life on the reef. At the same time he studied the coral and planned manoeuvres for refloating the Matipo.

He had patiently awaited the first rescue tug last July but the Lady Liza, with three men aboard, was never seen again after it apparently struck a cyclone one day out of Auckland.

This time, the fateful cyclone was to be more merciful. On Christmas Eve new help had arrived Skipper Glenn Corn thwaite, with the 90-ton coaster Onewa from Auckland. The Onewa men set up a system of cables linking the Mativo to three one ton anchors. These were set in a position to guide the Matipo over the reefs and into the lagoon when the January high tides came.

The Matipo was unloaded of its remaining cargo rotten onions and potatoes went over board, the lumber was floated into

port while the two prize passen gers—a pair of pedigree bulls— had already been taken off some months before.

Finally the high tides came and the Caledonians’ hopes went out to Captain Brown. But the cables did not hold the anchors— the men’s struggle in sun and grease on the winches was in vain.

In all the months of his soli tary waiting, Captain Brown seldom received fresh food. He explained that he “didn’t have the patience to fish” and rationed his water carefully, as he did not know when the next lot would be shipped out to him. As for the radio—“the batteries ran dry some months ago”.

With the arrival of the Onewa, his isolation ended, and all men were on an expedition to Noumea for food when the cyclone struck.

It was not until a day later that they could return to the reef and there they saw the work of Colleen. The Matipo was washed off the reef and safely tethered inside the lagoon. The men jubilantly cut the anchors and after a 13-hour tow by the Onewa to Noumea, Captain Brown finally ended his nine-month voyage from Auckland.

Captain Brown explained his running aground was due to a mistaken sighting of the Amedee Lighthouse, one of the few light houses in the world to have a fixed and not flashing light. (The French authorities are now treat ing this problem, and a flashing light should be operating within a few months.) Meanwhile, Matipo’s owner, Mr. Athol Rusden of Auckland, quickly flew to Noumea and arranged for the vessel to be escorted to dry dock repairs in Brisbane.

Captain Brown then expected to return to New Zealand and join his wife and three children in Nelson.

built in Sydney. Clive hopes it will be at the island by late April.

Both boats will carry up to 30 people and should help boost Howe’s tourist industry, which, incidentally, dipped slightly last year.

New Crayfishing Rules

In The New Hebrides

French and British authorities in the New Hebrides have introduced new crayfishing regulations to protect the condominium’s crayfish which have been overfished recently by European and New Hebridean fisher men.

Under the new regulations all cray fishing during breeding periods— December 1 to February 28—is out.

Outside these three months, cray fish bearing eggs and/or measuring under eight inches must be thrown back.

The condominium’s Agricultural Department is optimistic that locals will comply with the regulations and allow the depleted numbers of cray fish to increase.

P-Ng To Investigate Grounding

Of Chinese Fishing Boat

The circumstances surrounding the wreckage of a small National Chinese fishing boat on the coast of New Britain, 50 miles from Rabaul, will be investigated by the Papua-New Guinea Administration.

It is believed that the boat, equipped with refrigeration and fish ing gear, was reached a few days after its grounding by another Chinese fishing vessel which rescued its crew.

The incident closely follows tougher fishing limits set up around the NG coast. Overseas vessels are now banned from fishing within 12 miles of the coast. They are only allowed inside in emergencies.

Shipping Roundup

• Chin Lien Yien in February was the fourth Formosan fishing vessel to be arrested in recent months in NG waters. The RAN patrol boat HMAS Aitape nabbed her on February 12 fishing north-east of Tolokiwa Island, western New Britain, within the 12mile declared fishing zone. HMAS Aitape took her to Lae, where the captain and crew of the vessel were fined a total of $5OO. • Two youths were missing, be lieved drowned, after a small punt was lost in the Natewa Bay area of Vanua Levu in early February. Joji Saurara Varani, 19, and Semi Vuli vuli, 18, had left Natewa Village to travel to Lakeba Village in the eight foot punt. • Moana, formerly the GEIC, Wholesale Society’s Moanaraoi, was one of the casualties when Cyclone

Colleen hit Noumea recently. Now registered in Noumea, Moana was thrown against the wharf and many of her frames were damaged. She was due in Suva in mid-February for repairs. • The American Samoan Govern ment is hunting for two 55 ft steel hulled utility boats to complete its fleet. They must have room for 25 passengers and 1,600 cubic feet of freight and also be able to berth a ship. • NG’s Agricultural Department’s Fisheries Research and Survey Section has begun building a $15,000 fish processing works at Kavieng, New Ireland. The works, which will front Bagail Village, should boost local fishing operations and reduce imports of fish, which are subject to costly freight charges. (Over)

• Burns Philp’s veteran New Hebrides trader Manutai was “on the road again” recently after four weeks’ repairs in Vila. Manutai took some knocks from hurricane Becky off South Epi, New Hebrides, in Decem ber. • Shippers in Fiji, the Samoas and Tonga, who weathered a freight charge raise to NZ a little over two years ago, have been dealt another blow. On March 1 charges on the two Union Steam Ship vessels Tofua and Taveuni went up by about 7i per cent. The reason given for the rise was that shipping costs are in creasing. The company’s rates were last increased on February 16, 1967. • Haapai, the mid-Tongan island group, will be bypassed indefinitely by the Union Steam Ship Company vessel Taveuni because of an antici pated sharp decline in the area’s banana production. Haapai’s bananas were badly hit by January’s hurri cane. Local growers will be able to ship bananas to the Tongan capital, Nukualofa, by the trader Kao, which makes calls at Pangai and other Haapai islands. • Karkar Island, off Madang, NG, has a new $12,000 wharf built with over 1,300 tons of rock. The NG Administration footed about a third of the bill and the island council paid the rest. The wharf, 50 ft by 16 ft, has a 300 ft causeway con necting it to the shore. • With the Matipo now freed from its New Caledonian reef it is now expected that her owner, Athol Rusden, will re-enter the NZ-New Hebrides trade with her or another vessel (see story p. 103). This run is currently served by the Reef Shipping Co Ltd., of Fiji, with the trader Jean Philippe. Jean Philippe started operating on July 4 last year out of Onehunga, NZ, and she has sailed monthly from Auckland since then. Managing agents for the line are Trans Pacific Marine Ltd., of Auckland. • In April W. R. Carpenter takes over from Burns Philp as the NG agent for the Austasia’s Line Ltd.

The switch has been described as a “wedding of convenience” by Austa sia’s Mr. H. Dean. He said the change was in line with other Aus tralian agency changes for Austasia.

BP’s had had the agency in NG for over three years. • MI LI, the US Trust Territory’s ambitious new shipper, has chartered two additional ships for its territory runs. They are the Norwegian Hoi

Kung and the British Taipoosek and both will go on the Japan-Majuro route, a move designed to cut into the trade of the GEIC’s trader Moanaraoi. • Palolo, the West Samoan Gov ernment dredge working on coral blasting at Asau Harbour, Savaii, was damaged in mid-February after it listed badly when one of its pivots went askew. Meanwhile, construction firms from many parts of the Pacific were reported interested in tendering for the completion of the Asau pro

ject. Names mentioned include Dillinghams of Hawaii, Fletcher of NZ, Australia Dredging and a French firm operating in French Polynesia. • Four sailors from NG arrived at Sydney’s HMAS Nirimba training set-up in February to train as engine room officers in NG patrol boats.

They are Messrs. G. Aiede, of Daru, R. Heni, of Port Moresby, G. Kuri, of Goroka, and A. Linga, of New Britain. They will be in Sydney for 18 months.