Student, 18, survives ship ordeal

By ELLEN TIAMU
JUNIAS Naure, an 18-year-old from East New Britain had just got on the mv Rabaul Queen last Wednesday Feb 1 at about midday.
This was his first trip on a boat and also to Lae where he had been accepted to attend the PNG Polytechnical College this year. And when the tow line was at the wharf at Kimbe, he was as excited as any teenager.
The sea was not too bad until they reached Bulu Point in West New Britain that afternoon and the winds started blowing, swells started rising and tossed the boat around. 
As the ship was packed, Naure could not find a place to rest so stood for most of the night or wandered about on the restless three-decked passenger boat.
As they left the Solomon Sea into Vitiaz Strait that night, the boat was thrown about so much by the waves that the young man felt tragedy would strike. Near Siassi island he called his parents in Kimbe at about 1am on Thursday that they were having a little trouble.
With his cellphone battery almost out, he put off the phone and wandered about on all three decks as he had earlier done, checking out who was also  on the ship and willing himself to stay awake.
Naure said he wasn’t scared or anything but was confident that things would turn out well although people were vomiting around him with many looking anxious and clearly distressed.
Five and a half hours later they greeted the morning sun along the coast of Finschhafen in Morobe  and with gale winds still chopping the sea, the captain sent a crew member to notify passengers not to hang out on one side of the boat and cause it to tilt to one side.
Naure assisted the crew to spread the information but was told “yu stap we taim si i raf aste nait (Where were you when the sea was roughest last night)?”
He then retired to the bottom deck to have a coke and packet of twisties and called out to one of his mates, David Sap, to come and share food that his parents had prepared for him. Sap was unwell as he had vomited all night and was lying weakened on the floor.
Another male passenger joined him at his invitation and while they were trying to enjoy their meal, he looked down on the floor and saw that a friends boom box was not sitting right.
It was about 7.30am and suddenly a wave struck causing the ship to tilt onto its left side.  
Naure was still at the lower deck of the vessel on the left hand side so found people falling on top of him as the right side went up.
Children and adults screamed as the lights went out and water started rushing in bringing with it oil that had begun to leak.
Naure managed to break free from other passengers, some of whom were already taking in water. He swam towards the steps going to the upper decks and swam to the first floor.
There he was with other people with water up to their necks. Screaming and praying continued and by then children’s lifeless bodies were already floating about.
He and others in there spotted a sliding glass window that was about a little more than one foot by one foot that could allow a child or slim person to swim through.
In the seconds that mattered and when noone else dared open the window, Naure pushed it open and swam out into the open sea but realising that he was quickly running out of breath, returned into the cabin through the window.
When his fellow passengers asked, he said there was nothing else they could do but await their fate.
About a minute later the ship keeled over onto its right side.
The passengers looked up and saw the sky and Naure quickly clambered out the window onto the left side of the overturned boat where he saw a life raft and a woman floundering about in the water.
He quickly urged the tired woman onto the raft and began calling out for others to get on the life raft and with the help of another Polytech student named Sapak, urged other women in the sea near them to get into the life raft.
Three other passengers from his group in the second deck came out of the same window he did but the others could not make it in time because someone bigger was still struggling to get through and the boat was taking in water.
Naure said when they pushed their raft away from the sinking ship there were 20 other people on the raft but he noticed that there were others with not many people on.
He described the sea around them as oily and black with many taking in the substance in their attempts to seek assistance.
He said he also noticed that many mothers decided to give up the fight when they lost their children.
The young survivor said it took about 15 minutes from the time when the vessel first keeled over to when they were safely on the life raft.
They drifted until about lunchtime, managing to ration the water and biscuits that were in the raft, when they saw an international cargo ship and fired a flare.
A helicopter came by soon after that and they were able to board one of the ocean-going vessels at 4pm that afternoon after being afloat for about eight hours.
They arrived in Lae at 6am on Friday and were quickly taken the Angau Memorial Hospital for medical checks.
Naure said he had noticed at the start of his journey that the majority of passengers were from Bougainville and the Highlands region.
He thanked God for his survival.
Naure’s suggestion for shipping companies is that they must have safety drill before each trip so passengers will know what to do if trouble strikes.