Kookaburra2011
June 6, 1957: reserves training ship HMAS JUNEE makes an emergency departure - WAN.
7049. Looking at some risk of being jammed between a sharp bow and a hard wharf, ran rating Mike Cummings rating is hauled aboard the training corvette HMAS JUNEE as the ship makes an emergency departure from Fremantle on a sea rescue mission. Sailors hand up his kit bag as Cummings makes the leap. JUNEE, in use as a training ship for naval reserves and national servicemen, was going to the aid of a Norwegian freighter, SS TRAFALGAR, whose deck had split open in heavy seas and was taking water 1000 miles off the West Australian coast when he radio went dead.
The little ship was leaving to meet TRAFALGAR with oxy-welding equipment but was recalled soon after when the Norwegian ship again established contact and was able to say that her assistance was not needed.
It would have been one of her last adventures. The Bathurst Class corvette paid off on Aug. 21 that year, and was sold to a local concern for scrapping the following year, 1958. Her hulk was eventually sunk in the ships grave 20 miles west of Rottnest island a full 10 years later.
Built by Poole and Steel Ltd in Balmain Sydney , and completed on April 26, 1944, JUNEE was one of several RAN corvettes that performed fine service at the end of WWII liberating prisoners of war and other internees on Ambon, and transporting them to medical treatment facilities at Morotai. .
Photo: West Australian Newspapers, newspaper negative No. Navy 496b. This and other images from the 1991 WAN booklet 'A Small War' have been shown elsewhere on Flickr by one of the Photostream's Contributors, and are shared here with his kind permission.
June 6, 1957: reserves training ship HMAS JUNEE makes an emergency departure - WAN.
7049. Looking at some risk of being jammed between a sharp bow and a hard wharf, ran rating Mike Cummings rating is hauled aboard the training corvette HMAS JUNEE as the ship makes an emergency departure from Fremantle on a sea rescue mission. Sailors hand up his kit bag as Cummings makes the leap. JUNEE, in use as a training ship for naval reserves and national servicemen, was going to the aid of a Norwegian freighter, SS TRAFALGAR, whose deck had split open in heavy seas and was taking water 1000 miles off the West Australian coast when he radio went dead.
The little ship was leaving to meet TRAFALGAR with oxy-welding equipment but was recalled soon after when the Norwegian ship again established contact and was able to say that her assistance was not needed.
It would have been one of her last adventures. The Bathurst Class corvette paid off on Aug. 21 that year, and was sold to a local concern for scrapping the following year, 1958. Her hulk was eventually sunk in the ships grave 20 miles west of Rottnest island a full 10 years later.
Built by Poole and Steel Ltd in Balmain Sydney , and completed on April 26, 1944, JUNEE was one of several RAN corvettes that performed fine service at the end of WWII liberating prisoners of war and other internees on Ambon, and transporting them to medical treatment facilities at Morotai. .
Photo: West Australian Newspapers, newspaper negative No. Navy 496b. This and other images from the 1991 WAN booklet 'A Small War' have been shown elsewhere on Flickr by one of the Photostream's Contributors, and are shared here with his kind permission.