The Bellubera's launch

On 26 April 1910, the Bellubera was launched at Mort's Dock, Woolwich, Sydney, the largest and fastest Manly Ferry built to date. She was 210 feet (63 metres) long and 32 (9.75 metres) feet wide with a gross tonnage of 499 tons. Two boilers provided steam for the two triple expansion engines which drove the single props at either end of the ferry.

Carrying 1,529 passengers, it did not take too long for the Bellubera to achieve its reputation as a hoodoo ship. On 10 May 1910, soon after being launched and while been fitted out, chains holding one of the 40 ton boilers broke and it fell into the hull causing considerable damage.

The next trouble the Bellubera got into was off Dobroyd Head (opposite The Heads) on 2 April 1914 when she cut in half the Kate, a tug which was towing a lighter. It was lucky that the lighter was not hit as it was carrying a considerable amount of high explosives. The Bellubera was not damaged. The next 21 years appear to have been fairly uneventful.

The steam powered ferries were expensive and inconvenient to operate. For this reason, it was decided to convert the Bellubera to diesel electric power. In September 1935 after just over 25 years service, the Bellubera went into have her steam engines removed and be converted to diesel-electric. The Bellubera was only the second British vessel (note this anachronism) to be so converted. After the steam engines and boilers were removed, the Bellubera had four Harland & Wolff five cylinder two-stroke diesel engines of 450 bhp installed. These drove direct-current generators which supplied electric current to four electric-propulsion motors of 615 hp each. Two 85 bhp diesel engines were installed to power the generating plant for lighting and auxiliary power.

The Bellubera at Circular Quay	The Bellubera still smoldering from the fire in 1936

On 28 June 1936, the Bellubera returned to service but from then on the hoodoo really got worse. Sometime after this an engineer cut his finger on a section of the engine. Within two weeks he was dead from blood poisoning. On 16 November 1936 while at the Kurraba Point ferry yards, a fire started on board the Bellubera when sparks from an oxy torch fell onto a seat and burst into flames. Five men were trapped inside the ship for nearly an hour until the fire was extinguished. The Bellubera was a burnt out shell with damage estimated at £40,000. Worse still, two men, Robert Findlay, 38, fitter and Sidney Tight, 44, greaser, died as a result of the fire. Two other men were injured, including one who spent almost two years in hospital.

In October 1937 the Bellubera was returned to service after extensive repairs at the Cockatoo Island dockyard. The diesel engines were overhauled but not replaced. The engines gave trouble after that time and later they were to be replaced.

On the night of 9 September 1941 during heavy rain, Sidney Rose, 54, died when the Bellubera ran down the 30 ft Sydbridge off the current site of the Opera House.

The next incident occurred on 6 February 1945 as the Bellubera approached the Heads when Captain Wally Dohrn (Snr) collapsed and died of a heart attack. In September of the same year, a young woman, apparently feeling seasick, leaned too far over the railing and fell overboard. Luckily, two soldiers saw what happened and they dived in and rescued her.

Soon after this incident, a young man leaped over the side of the Bellubera shouting that he wanted to die. The Bellubera turned around and lowered a boat which dragged him (fighting) back to safety. The Bellubera's horror year continued when on 31 January 1946 a man fell from the top deck of the ferry as it passed Clifton Gardens. He drowned.

The strangest story about the Bellubera happened on the night of 17 August 1948 when she was near the spot where Captain Dohrn died. Passengers heard loud moans coming from the water. Searchlights were used to comb the water but nothing was seen and no-one was missing. It is reported (the Australian Government Environment Web Site) that on 19 October 1948 she was in a serious collision near Sydney Heads. I have not been able to confirm this report. Perhaps it is an error of dates, see next paragraph re collision near Bradleys Head.

On 16 August 1949 a Navy stoker fell from the Bellubera. Fifteen minutes later in the pitch black darkness, passengers on the Dee Why heard shouts from the water. The ferry stopped and the lucky man was saved. As if all this was not enough, just over a year later on 18 October 1950 the Bellubera collided with a 7,000 ton freighter Taurus off Bradleys Head. Fifteen feet of the ferry's lower deck was smashed.

It was to be five years before the Bellubera made news again but first it was to be re-engined. In February 1954 the Bellubera went to the State Dockyard at Newcastle and had three English Electric diesel engines installed to replace the four old engines. On 21 October 1954 she returned to service and continued for another 19 years using these engines.

On the night of 20 August 1955 a man fell off the Bellubera but this was not reported to the crew until she docked at Manly. The ferry quickly returned to where the passenger said the man would be and there they found him swimming. He was handed over to the Police.

Off Fort Denison on 27 February 1958 a woman fell overboard. The Water Police found her completely submerged. She recovered.

At about 10.15 pm on 25 June 1960, the Bellubera stuck an object, believed to be a log, at The Heads, which buckled the rudder and fouled the prop. The engines stopped and she began to drift towards Dobroyd Head and then Manly Point. Finally after 35 minutes the anchor took hold saving her from further damage.

On 14 October 1960 a man jumped off her near Middle Head. He was found some time later by the collier SS Mortlake Bank clinging to a channel marker.

The next year another skipper of the Bellubera died at the wheel. On 3 February 1961 Albert Villiers collapsed and died of a heart attack while berthing the ferry for refuelling. Later the same year on 13 December she broke down near The Heads and she was towed into Watsons Bay after nearly hitting the rocks below Middle Head.

Another decade was to pass before the Bellubera's last incident. On 28 February 1970 she rammed the anti-submarine destroyer HMAS Parramatta while the warship was refuelling off Clifton Gardens and tore a hole 6 ft by 8 ft in the warship's side. The Bellubera was also damaged but I am not sure of the extent of this damage.

After 63 years faithful, if somewhat dangerous service to Sydney, the Bellubera made its last run to Manly on 29 November 1973 (or 29 October if other records are to be believed).

By my reckoning, the Bellubera had collided with at least four (possibly five) vessels, sinking two of them, seven persons had died through direct association with the ferry and at least seven people had fell or jumped off the ferry in mid-Harbour.

The Bellubera undergoing salvage prior to being scuttled Photo by Stuart McPherson

After lying on the Harbour for almost seven years, the Bellubera was scuttled off Long Reef as part of the artificial reef on 1 August 1980. Stuart McPherson contacted me and told me that as a teenager with a camera and an interest in Manly Ferries, he was around quite a lot as this vessel was being broken up in Cockle Bay in the first half of 1980. The following is an almost verbatim report of what he told me. The Bellubera almost managed to kill one more person as she was being broken up. The vessel had been purchased by a company named "Trouble Shooter", run by a Dutchman called Jensen. He had purchased her so certain equipment could be stripped from her and installed into an ex-RAN minesweeper, the former HMAS Gull. The Gull (renamed Trouble Shooter, with its hull painted bright yellow) was to become a rescue vessel of some sort, but at the time was a hull in the water with no engines.

Stuart advises me that in the end, Bellubera's English Electric diesels were removed and provided to the Public Transport Commission to help keep the North Head and Baragoola in service. In exchange, Trouble Shooter was given a pair of engines (presumably by the PTC) for installation into the minesweeper.

What subsequently became of this minesweeper is not known, but during 1980 it sat in Cockle Bay next to Bellubera, and across the bay from the SS South Steyne which was at that time also in a neglected state.

The Bellubera is about to go under to her final home Photo by Stuart McPherson	The Bellubera is still afloat but not for long Photo by Stuart McPherson

Stuart says that part way into the stripping of the vessel, large sections of the teak decking were removed whole. The steel deck stringers were cut with an oxy, and then an entire section of decking lifted out by crane in one piece (presumably for sale). It was a faster way of removing the decking timber, because the company had a deadline from the Maritime Services Board (1 August 1980) for the hull to be scuttled. Things were done in a hurry. (Stuart tells me that he has none of the decking timber, but did obtain a pair of the distinctive padded upper-deck benches, which currently live in his garage.)

One of these sections was removed at the bottom of the after stairway. Directly below this lay the gearbox for two electric motors to drive the aft propellor. This gearbox (a large piece of equipment) had also been lifted out of the hull, leaving a number of large threaded rods in rows sticking up vertically (it was these that "bolted" the gearbox to the hull). One wet day Stuart arrived at the wharf. The guys from Trouble Shooter were gathered around and the mood was gloomy. Apparently he had just missed the ambulance. One of the employees had skidded down the wet stairway and gone straight through the big hole where the decking used to be. He landed on the bed where the gearbox used to be, right between two rows of these tall threaded rods. Had he landed slightly to the right or the left, he would have been impaled.

Stuart managed to score a ride on a privately-owned cruiser when she was towed out the heads and scuttled on 1 August 1980. Fortunately, following some time in hospital the injured man was intact enough to ride on the same boat as Stuart and watch Bellubera sink. Stuart forgets his name, but he appears in one or two of his photos of the day. He remembers him being particularly glad to see her go down.

Stuart also reports that the Bellubera went down completely level, unlike the Dee Why which had her bow (or stern?) stuck high in the air.

One set of bollards on the eastern section of the wreck	Andreas Thimm entering the broken end of the eastern section of the wreck

The ship appears to have broken into two parts when she sank. The GPS reading for the main section of the Bellubera is a latitude of 34° 42' 48" S and longitude of 151° 21' 00" E. Note that all the GPS Readings on my Web Site are taken using AUS66 as the map datum. If you use another datum you may be about 220 metres off the wreck. See my GPS Page for more details and how to convert readings. Marks for the wreck are to have the vertical section of Bangally Point (to the north) just intersecting with the ridge on the northern side of Broken Bay. The eastern mark is the Bahai Temple lined up exactly between two houses on the ridge about one third of the way to the water. Also, there are two large towers (light towers at a sports field I think) close to the water. Take the distance from the left tower to the right one and then place the right one about the same distance to the left of the Bahai Temple. The wreck comes up from about 46 metres to 42 metres or so. The wreck lies east-west. This will put you over the eastern end of the wreck.

The eastern bow of the Bellubera

On 31 August 2002 I finally got to dive this wreck. The ship lies on its side in about 45 or 46 metres. The bow section here (remember that there were two bows - this is the eastern bow) is very intact. The wreck here comes up to 41 or 42 metres on the top of the bow. You can see the rudder as well as where the prop used to be. On the top of the bow you can see the rudder assembly. You can enter the wreck and it is an interesting explore. There is a broken toilet here. This section of the wreck has a huge number of nannygai as well as some huge Sergeant Bakers (we saw one eating a nannygai).

About 15 metres along the hull is broken and the upper part has fallen to the southern side. Past here the wreck is more intact again. The next 20 metres of the wreck has some places to explore. Then the wreck comes to an end. The hull on either side is very twisted, and it appears to me that the ship broke into two when she was scuttled. The other section is apparently 30 metres or so away and used to be connected by a rope. I have not yet examined this section.

Not a bad dive, fairly easy with some simple penetrations. Visibility on my two dives so far has been between seven and fifteen metres or so.

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