The ship was only a few miles off the British coastline and radio touch with shore stations. She was fitted with up-to-date radar and electronic navigating equipment, and well supplied with life-saving gear for her passengers. She was built especially this particular run, and was on her normal service. Yet, although she appealed desperately for help for more than four hours, although Royal Air Force and civil airline planes, Royal Navy vessels and life-boats collaborated in a rescue operation, no one was able to find her in time. She disappeared, on a scheduled run, with 176 passengers and crew, only a few miles from the port she was making for; yet certainly, there was no lack of diligent efforts by rescuers to get to her.
The ferry was 308 feet long, forty-eight feet in breadth, and had a draught of thirteen feet. The hull was divided into nine watertight compartments. There were sliding steel doors at her stern, giving entrance to the 170-feet-long car-deck. Her twin screws were directly driven by two diesel main engines. Her normal speed on her run was 18 knots. She had six lifeboats, three on each side, capable of holding a total of 333 people. She had a main wireless transmitter and an emergency transmitter and receiving apparatus. She was also fitted with a direction-finding apparatus and radar. Among the other passengers there were many women and children. None of them survived the disaster.
The keepers at Kirkcolm Lighthouse reported her position and watched her disappear into the gloomy winter light. Between 9 a. m. and 9.30 a. m. the confused seas smashed the stern doors of the ferry. Water swamped the car-deck, and the scuppers proved too small to allow it to flow freely off. She became flooded very quickly, the cargo began to shift, and she listed about ten degrees to starboard.
The seamen fought manfully to close the stern doors, but could not move them. A carpenter and two seamen were ordered to the forecastle head to free the bow rudderwhich would enable her to return stern first to Loch Ryanbut the waves crashing over the bow beat the seamen back before they could release the rudder's securing pin.
The nearest ship to pick up the distress message was the "Salvela", a salvage steamer. She altered her course to speed in the direction of the ship in disaster, but the seas delayed her, and she did not arrive until other rescue vessels were on the scene.
The shore stations, which had been in radio touch with the ship since 10.40 a. m., had tried to obtain a "fix" on the vessel, but none could locate her position accurately. At 11.25 a. m. the ship sent out: "SOS, position approximately five miles W. N. W. from Corsewall." Five minutes later a Port Patrick lifeboat asked for the latest information, and received word from the radio-telephone station that the ship was five miles north-west of Corsewall. She had repeated her estimated position at 11.35 a. m. with the message: "Position approximately five miles west-north-west from Corsewallcar-deck floodedvery heavy list to starboardship not under commandrequire immediate assistance."
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Three ships which had heard the earlier messages, but had not set out to join in the search because they believed that other rescuers were close, at once headed for the area.
They were: the trawler ' Eastcoates, sheltering from the storm in Belfast Lough, the coastal tanker "Pass of Drumochter," moored in Carrick Roads in the Lough, and the cattle-and-cargo coaster "Lairdsmoor," returning to the Lough for shelter.
The sea was dotted with rafts, and a few people managed to hold on to them. Two servicewomen were seen clinging to each other on a raft, but they disappeared before rescue came. The icy water numbed other passengers, weakening their grasp on the rafts, and the seas washed many away.
A trawler saved a naval officer, then it found three men and four women, but they died on board from exhaustion.
A Donaghsdee lifeboat came to port with about forty of the rescued, but the other ships stayed around the wreckage until late at night, continuing to pour oil on the confused waters, playing searchlights on each piece of floating debris and over the rafts. The search ended only when they were sure that there could be no more survivors from the ferrv in those awesome seas.
Ex. I. Answer the following questions:
1. What was the ship's position at the time of the disaster?
2. What equipment was she fitted with?
3. Who collaborated in the rescue operation?
4. Why couldn't she be found in time?
5. What were the particulars of the ferry?
6. What was her life-saving gear like?
7. Who watched her and reported her position?
8. What was the cause of the disaster?
9. Why did the car-deck become flooded?
10. What made her list to starboard?
Ex. II. Translate the following sentences into English:
1. .
2. .
3. .
4. , , .
5. , , , .
