The daily morning Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Oregon) 1883-1899, 1895-12-25
The Cargo Takes Fire in Mid
Ocean.
GOOD JUDGMENT SAVES SHIP
Capt. Jorgensen, of the British Ship
Hiawatha, Tells His Story Of
Battle With the Flames.

San Francisco Chronicle
The British ship Hiawatha, Captain
Jorgensen, arrived yesterday 164 days
from Grangemouth, England, and 107 days
from Pernambuco, with 1000 tons of coal.
Her narrow and providential escape from
destruction by fire in the cargo at sen
may be best told In Captain Jorgensen's
full and complete memorandum, which Is
as follows:
Left Grangemouth roads on the 9th OF
July. Passed to the north Of Scotland.
Had light and variable winds down to 30
deg. north, where we got the northeast
trade winds, which were light and varia-
BILE throughout. Lost the northeast
trades in II deg. Is min. north. and after
couple of days of variables we got the
southwest monsoon. On the 18th OF Au-
gust, In Q deg IS min. north 10 deg 66
min. west noticed q strong smell Of coal
gas coming up from the fore hatch. Had
the searching rods In the hatchways ex-
amined and found the coal heated. hut
no fire was observed. Being sure that
there was something wrong we had all
the matches taken Of and rods driven
down in different parts of the hatches,
and after having had one rod down in
the middle of the main hatch for about
fifteen minutes 1t came out almost red
hot.
Seeing that we had no time to lose, we
Immediately commenced to discharge
Goals overheard from the main hatch.
After a little while smoke issued from
the Goals, the smoke increasing as we
worked down. About seven below the
main deck, in the middle Of the hatch
we found the Goals on fire. which was
put out, but n very dense smoke issued
from the lower hold on the port side.
We pumped water on the Goals, but II
did not seem to have any effect, aa we
could not get 1t near enough to the iire,
so we kept on discharging.
In spite of all our efforts, we found
that the fire was gaining on us all the
time, and the heat and smoke became so
suffocatlng that the men could not t7nd
1t in the hold more than about ten min
utes at q time.
on the 18th flames burst out from the
Goals on the port side OF the hatch. We
had quantity Of water pumped on the
Goals and had the flames suhdued and
proceeded again with the discharge; had
the steam donkey working all the tine
and kept on discharging day and night
Flames were bursting out from the Goals
every now and then, but we got them
under control again by pumping on water.
| on the 18th OF August we had got down
| on the lower hold, about seven feet be-
low the beams on the port side. We
were then down to the second fire, and
the Goals were mixed with ashes and
burning Goals, and the fire was reaching
from the middle OF the main hatch and
aft to abreast Of the mainmast. We
then commenced to pump water on the
Goals, and after about one hours pump
ing the smoke and heat were decreasing,
and at noon we had the fire In the main
| hatch extingushed
After having mastered the main hatch
we found that the heat In the fore and
after matches had increased to very seri-
| Gus extent We commenced 10 trim up
Goals from the middle Of the matches, and
worked down about fourteen feet deep
| from the deck in both matches, where we
| found the Goals so hot that they burned
the fingers when taken in the hand We
had to pump water on to stop them from
taking fire.
on the 2ist of August we found the
Goals In the fore part OF the main hatch
again on the point OF taking fire, and,
seeing that under such circumstances II
was Impossible to proceed, we resolved 10
put into Pernambuco, where we arrived
n the 2thsof August We got INTO port
| on the 26th, discharging 57S tons OF coal,
and left again on the 10th OF September
The remainder OF the voyage TO san
| Francisco was uneventful, and the cap
| tain had no more trouble with fires.