M.V.KAITAWA
Ship No 375
The M.V. KAITAWA was an order from the Union Steamship Company of New Zealand, first ship of a three ship order.
She was a large modern twin screw diesel cargo vessel of 2,485 tons with a length of 290 feet, and a beam of 43 feet and draught of 19 feet and six inches. Built to carry coal and general cargo.
She was launched from the Leith shipyard on 19th October 1948.
Made countless voyages from the West Coast with coal and was lost with all hands without trace in heavy weather near Cape Maria van Dieman on 23 May 1966. A reminder to all, of the always present danger of a life at sea.
4 comments:
This ship was lost on Pandora Bank on my first night at sea. I was a first trip Deck Boy. We sailed from Queens Wharf Auckland that evening. The first words I heard next morning was "a cargo has sunk off North Cape" New Zealand.
Tony Taylor.
I worked for USSCo in the early to mid 70s including some time on the Westport - Whangarei coal run. The vessel I was on was the Karetu: relatively modern and well equipped compared with the Kaitawa. We at least had radar and echo sounder although no gyro compass or auto pilot. The Kaitawa had virtually no nav aids bar the magnetic compass..not even an echo sounder ! So it would be quite easy to get a bit lost in poor weather and at night. No doubt there were heavy breakers over Pandora Bank and she would have capsized pretty quickly leaving little time to launch any lifesaving equipment.
I am intrigued as to why she was twin screw and of low horsepower ?
Correction: Kaitawa was not lost without trace. The wreck site is charted, wreckage was found (positively from Kaitawa) and one body was found and identified. There are, however, many unanswered questions about what happened to Kaitawa and her exact location at the time she sent a Mayday.
Lots of info about Kaitawa at maritimeradio.org
i was a ordinary seaman at the time and a story that came out when they located the wreck was a detonater had somehow set off the gases and had blown the hull open as the hole was shattered outwards..i suppose there would be some gasses from the coal in the holds eh
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