79 Years on

[Des Taff Jenkins]

This last week Families in NSW fare welled the 32 crew of the Steamship Wollongbar sunk by a Jap sub on April 29th 1943. The position of the wreck only discovered in 2019 off Port Macquarie NSW couldn't be checked during the Covid epidemic.
Of the crew of 37 only five survived. One of them a Captain Mason was returning to the bridge when the Chief Engineer yelled out "Look to Port'. where with a big splash a sub was diving, two torpedoes were racing towards the ship, they blew the ship in half and she sunk quickly. The sub was the I180 Cap't Toshio Kusaka.
The families of the crew hired a ferry to drop flowers over the wreck.
As an aside, the people of Port Macquarie baked many cakes after the sinking as the boxes of butter washed up on the beach, as the Wollongbar carried a full cargo of butter.
Des

[Colin Wood]

She was a regular trader to the NE coast of NSW and there are photographs memorabilia of her in the Maclean Heritage museum in NSW .

[Doc Vernon]

The sinking of the Wollongbar II - Anzac Portal (dva.gov.au)

Families get closure 79 years after WW2 steamer torpedoed by Japanese (smh.com.au)

SS Wollongbar II mariners remembered at wreck site 79 years after Japanese torpedo attack - ABC News