Bast0n; what a great story and what fun it must have been in those glorious days of starter cartridges and hand cranks. Brilliant!
Some Bast0n-era memorabilia:
An Auster Starter Cartridge
I tried to find a Whirldwind starting cartridge but, alas, no joy. I'm assuming though that it can't have been too different from the example above, or, perhaps it was?
An Alvin Leonides advert from 1958
The blurb reads:
"The Alvis Leonides Major. A 16 cylinder radial engine of exceptionally compact dimensions gives the Westland Whirldwind better load-lifting and hovering ability and increases the height attainable in forward flight."
Soggy: Your shots are wonderful .. many thanks! So which one of this non-motley-crew are you? You seem to have been in the Farnborough environs at the same time as Nigel Osborn (I think). Brilliant to see just how much of Arethusa's bow could get out of the water. Great stuff!
The TSMS Lakonia Disaster
The Lakonia departed Southampton on December 19, 1963 for an 11-day "Christmas Cruise" of the Canary Islands. Her first scheduled stop was to be the island of Madeira. There were 646 passengers and 376 crewmen on board: a total of 1,022 people. All but 21 of the passengers were British citizens, and the crew members were mostly Greek and German. The captain of the Lakonia was 53-year-old Mathios Zarbis.
Fire alarms sounded, but too softly to be heard by most passengers. "The fire alarm bell was so weak that it sounded like someone calling the waiter to ask for tea," one survivor later told reporters. An alarm went off on the bridge, pinpointing the fire’s location. The ship was about 180 miles north of Madeira
At the time the blaze was discovered, most of the passengers were in the ship's ballroom, called the Lakonia Room, dancing at the "Tropical Tramps' Ball." Passengers began to notice the smell of smoke, but most dismissed it as strong cigar smoke. Captain Zarbis, who had been notified of the fire, attempted to make an announcement on the ship's intercom system, but it had been disabled by the blaze. As smoke began to fill the ballroom at about 11:30, the band stopped playing and cruise director George Herbert ushered the frightened passengers to the boat deck. The upper deck was ablaze within 10 minutes.
Many of the passengers who had been asleep in their cabins found themselves unable to escape the fire. Some passengers were told to go to the main dining room to await instructions, but most ignored this order, since the dining room lay directly in the path of the fire.
At 11:30 p.m., the ship's chief radio officer Antonios Kalogridis sent out the first distress call: "Fire spreading up. Prepare evacuation on ship." At midnight, a second distress call was sent out: "We are leaving the ship. Please immediately give us assistance. Please help us." Kalogridis sent out the last call at 12:22 a.m., just before the wireless room caught fire: "SOS from Lakonia, last time. I cannot stay anymore in the wireless station. We are leaving the ship. Please immediate assistance. Please help."
When all of the boats were away, there were still people adrift in the water and over 100 people left on board the burning ship. The Lakonia continued to burn fiercely and was rocked by violent explosions. Those who remained on board flocked to the glass-enclosed Agora Shopping Center at the stern of the ship. After several hours, the flames closed in on them, and they were forced to descend ropes and rope ladders into the ocean. The port and starboard gangways were lowered as well, and people walked down the gangways single file into the sea.
At 3:30 a.m., four hours after the first distress call, the 495-foot (151 m) Argentine passenger ship Salta arrived on the scene. The Salta, under the command of Captain José Barrere, had been on its way from Genoa, Italy to Buenos Aires. The 440-foot (130 m) British tanker Montcalm arrived half an hour later at 4:00 a.m. The majority of the survivors were saved by these two ships. The Salta rescued 475 people and took aboard most of Lakonia's lifeboats.
In the hours that followed, the Belgian ship Charlesville, the Brazilian freighter Rio Grande, the British passenger ship Stratheden and the Panamanian freighter Mehdi all arrived to take part in the rescue. Each of the rescue vessels dispatched boats to pluck survivors from the water. Also, four United States Air Force C-54 planes were sent from the Lajes Air Base in the Azores. The planes dropped flares, lifejackets, life rafts and survival kits to people in the water.
Rescue efforts were hindered by the fact that the Lakonia drifted for several miles during the evacuation. People in the water were dispersed over a 2 – 3-mile (4.8 km) area. Also, rescue ships were reluctant to get too near the Lakonia; there was a constant risk that the ship's 500 tons of fuel oil would explode.
Most of the survivors were transported to Madeira, while others, including Captain Zarbis, were taken to Casablanca.
A total of 128 people died in the Lakonia disaster, of which 95 were passengers and 33 were crew members.
Crewmen from the British aircraft carrier HMS Centaur were able to board the Lakonia on December 24, once the flames had died down. Most of the bodies were recovered by the crew of the Centaur. By this time, the Lakonia was a charred, smoking hulk. Her superstructure had partially collapsed amidships, and the bridge and aft decks had caved in. There were holes blasted near the bow, and the ship was listing 10 degrees to starboard.
The TSMS Lakonia ablaze on 23rd December 1963
A Royal Navy Westland Whirlwind from the British aircraft carrier HMS Centaur returns to the smouldering Lakonia on 24th December 1963 to lower crewmen who would recover bodies from the charred vessel