Help came too late for 13 doomed souls on board WD Atlas
As towering waves smashed its deck the captain of the dredger WD Atlas sent out a desperate mayday call. But it was already too late for 13 of his crew.
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It was the sort of night that gives ship captains nightmares. A screaming gale, towering waves and a vessel that should never have been put on the open sea.
When the mayday call went out the destroyer HMAS Vendetta was on exercises off Botany Bay. The Dredger WD Atlas, with a small crew on board, was in difficulty off Jervis Bay. The Vendetta headed as quickly as possible for the troubled ship, but was hampered by mountainous seas. A huge wave struck, swamping its boiler room and causing a power failure.
By the time the destroyer reached the dredger’s position, the WD Atlas was gone, taking with it 13 crew.
The Vendetta helped search for survivors as rescue teams battled on bravely in terrible conditions. Only four men were saved.
The WD Atlas had been doomed from the moment it left port. A bucket hopper dredger built by Ferguson Brothers in Glasgow, it was launched in 1949. A steel screw steamer with a gross registered tonnage of 761 tonnes and 55.23m long, it first went into service with the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board in Liverpool.
It dredged harbours and rivers under the administration of the Merseyside authority, seemingly without incident. After it had outlived its usefulness in Liverpool, the Atlas was sold to Sydney-based company Westminster Dredging (Australia) Ltd for dredging work in Australia.
On its voyage to Australia in 1965 the crew noticed problems with the ship, particularly its steering. The captain on that voyage, George Thexton, later reported that the steering was so bad the ship had to sometimes be pulled around in a full circle to get back on course.
At various stages of its journey the ship had to be towed or docked for repairs. A larger rudder was installed but it put strain on the steering gear and made little improvement to the handling of the ship. The trip via the Suez Canal took 133 days before it finally reached Whyalla in South Australia, where it was to dredge the inner harbour.
In May 1966 the Atlas prepared to leave Whyalla for Sydney, where it was to be overhauled before going on to New Zealand.
According to evidence at an inquiry into the disaster, the ship was thoroughly checked before its departure. However, these preparations failed to take into account the kind of wild weather that the ship was about to run into.
The ship had a tendency to roll even in moderate seas, but this time the weather was far more than the Atlas could handle. On May 20, at 10pm, when the ship was off Point Perpendicular at Jervis Bay, captain Alan Gordon McTackett could see they were in serious trouble as the engines were swamped and the ship began to list. He sent out a mayday call and warned his crew to stand by the lifeboats but the ship suddenly began to sink. The captain and the first mate yelled for the crew to jump but some were reluctant to plunge into the dark swirling waters.
Adelaide shipwright Sam de Vries, who was due to be married in just over two weeks and had only taken on the job aboard the Atlas to earn a bit of extra cash, decided the captain was not going to give orders to drop the lifeboats so he cut the ropes and jumped in after. He swam to the raft, pulling crewmate Jeffrey Mulder in with him. Fellow crewman Gordon Fairbairn, a fireman-greaser, jumped into the water and drifted for a time but was saved by clinging to the body of a drowned shipmate.
Rescuers, including those on the Vendetta, risked their own lives to save the survivors.
Mulder and de Vries drifted about 16km north where they were picked up by a ship 10 hours later. Fairbairn and another man were plucked from the sea by helicopter. Five bodies were pulled from the sea but a search continued for several days for eight crewmen who remained missing. It was finally called off on May 23.
The survivors tried to get on with their lives. Despite his ordeal, de Vries walked down the aisle in June. Several members of the search and rescue team were later awarded for bravery.
An inquiry found the ship had serious deficiencies and should never have been allowed to sail without a tug.
Originally published as Help came too late for 13 doomed souls on board WD Atlas
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