Moana Kuewa

|Home Page |Back to stories |

		2010.05.29 AUSTRALIA Scuba Dive S.S. Yongala Location: AUSTRALIA Magnetic Island The passenger ship SS Yongala sank off Cape Bowling Green on 23 March 1911. En route from Melbourne to Cairns, she steamed into a cyclone and sank without a trace south of Townsville, Australia. All one hundred and twenty-two people on board perished in what is considered one of the most tragic incidents in Australian maritime history. It was only in 1958 that the wreck of the Yongala was discovered lying in waters south of Townsville and it has since become renowned as an internationally regarded diving and tourist destination. Last year, it was voted as one of the top ten dive sites in the world based upon a survey of scuba divers. The wreck of Yongala was 109 meters (358 ft) in length. The bow points in a northerly direction (347º), and although it lies listing to starboard at an angle of between 60º and 70º, the vessel's structural integrity has been retained. The depth of water to the sea floor is approximately 30 meters (100 ft), with the upper sections of the wreck 16 meters (52 ft) below the surface. SS Yongala was a steel passenger and freight steamer built in Newcastle upon Tyne, England to special survey for the Adelaide Steamship Company, at a cost of £102,000. She was launched on 29 April 1903, was registered in Adelaide, and took up the busy passenger route linking the gold fields of Western Australia with the eastern ports of Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney. Following company tradition, the vessel was named after the small town of Yongala in South Australia, a word from the Nadjuri language which meant "good water“. The vessel was propelled by a large triple expansion steam engine driving a single propeller. The engine was built by Wallsend Shipway and Engineering Co. and she could attain an official top speed of 15.8 knots (29 km/h). However, in her previous 98 trips, it was recorded that Yongala often reached 17 knots (31 km/h). Five single ended steel boilers working under natural draught supplied steam of 180 pounds-force per square inch (1.24 MPa) pressure. At 15 knots, Yongala's engines burned approximately 67 tonnes of coal per day. Winches with derricks and derrick-posts, and two steam cranes were provided for efficient cargo handling. Electric lighting was fitted throughout the ship with a duplicate generating plant. It was also provided with refrigeration facilities for the carriage of frozen cargo. A specially arranged steam and hand steering gear was fitted in a house at the after end of the poop and controlled from the bridge. On 14 March 1911, under the command of Captain William Knight, Yongala embarked on its 99th voyage in Australian waters. It left Melbourne with 72 passengers, including the only two passengers who were to remain on board after reaching Brisbane, intending to travel to Cairns. The vessel arrived at the Municipal Wharf in Brisbane on the morning of 20 March. Captain William Knight, aged 62, was one of the company's most capable men, who had served the Adelaid Steamship Company 14 years without mishap or incident. On the morning of 23 March, Yongala steamed into Mackay to drop off and receive passengers and discharge 50 tons of cargo, leaving 617 tons in the lower hold—properly stowed. By 1:40 pm she departed, carrying 49 passengers and 73 crew, making a total of 122 people. Yongala was still in sight of land when the signal station at Flat Top (Mackay) received a telegram warning of a cyclone in the area between Townsville and Mackay. Although the first Australian shore-based wireless station capable of maintaining communication with ships had been established in Sydney in 1910, few ships carried wireless in 1911. Unfortunately, a wireless destined for installation in Yongala had only recently been dispatched from the Marconi Company and was waiting on the dock at Yongala’s next port . Further north the wind was swinging from the south east to the north west, and was coming from the north east when it would have hit Yongala, travelling at right angles to the full force. Yongala was posted as missing on 26 March although it was thought to have been lost on or about 23 March. News of wreckage found washed up on beaches gradually trickled in but there was no sign of the vessel or of those on board. Hope was abandoned by the following Wednesday after scores of vessels scoured the coast and found no trace. The only body ever found was that of the racehorse Moonshine, washed up at the mouth of Gordon Creek, not far from Ross Creek, Townsville. Many theories were put forward regarding the ship's possible location and reason for loss. Some speculated that it had been rendered helpless due to some unknown mishap between Whitsunday Passage and Cape Bowling Green or been overpowered by the extreme force of the wind; perhaps the anchors had been dropped causing the boat to slew broadside into the wind; others thought it had hit a submerged reef between Flinders Passage and Keeper Reef or run into Nares Rock, or even struck Cape Upstart. The Queensland government offered a £1,000 reward for information leading to the discovery of the ship. This was eventually withdrawn, as nothing of the vessel was ever heard. Communities throughout eastern and Southern Australia commemorated the tragedy in churches and village halls. Donations were offered to the "Yongala distress" fund, begun in March 1911 for the relief of families in distress. It ended on 30 September 1914, with an amount of £900 which had not been disbursed and which was credited to the Queensland Shipwreck Society Traveling Individuals Names: Jeffrey Cheske & Christine Bauman * All of the scuba diving pictures from the S.S. Yongala were captured from the Adrenaline Diving Company’s DVD. Most of information is from Wikipedia Encyclopedia’s Website