How Whiskey Destroyed a Ship: The Green Hill Park Tragedy
Column of smoke rises over downtown Vancouver from burning Green Hill Park
On March 6, 1945, a series of powerful explosions rocked the center of the port city of Vancouver, located on the Pacific coast of Canada. Window glass was blown out of hundreds of homes and even the massive steel doors of the port warehouses. A huge column of smoke rose above the city, and numerous signal lights flew into the air. missilesThinking that the city was under attack by the Japanese, many residents tried to take refuge in bomb shelters.
The Canadian merchant ship Green Hill Park, owned by the state-owned Park Steamship Company Limited and managed by the private firm Canada Shipping Company Limited, was burning at the pier, located just a hundred meters from the city center.
Green Hill Park on fire
The burning ship belonged to a large series of dry cargo ships of the Park type, a sort of Canadian version of the famous American Liberty. In total, from 1941 to 1945, 380 similarly designed Park and Fort type ships, as well as 20 tankers based on the Parks, were built at Canadian shipyards for Canada, Great Britain and the United States according to the design of the British firm JL Thompson and Sons (they also designed the Liberty). 30 of them were lost during military operations.
Commissioned in January 1944, Green Hill Park had a gross tonnage of 7130 GRT, a length of 129,39 m, a width of 17,37 m and a draft of 6,93 m. Five holds with tweendecks were used to carry cargo. For self-defense, the ship had a fairly powerful artillery armament, so on board, in addition to the 34 crew members, there was also a unit of DEMS (Defensively Equipped Merchant Ships) gunners, usually seven people.
Loading of the ship for Australia began on February 27. The cargo consisted mainly of timber, newsprint and tin ingots. Small consignments included a variety of items, from knitting needles and light bulbs to sunglasses. But among them were also cargoes classified as dangerous: 94 tons of sodium chlorate, seven and a half tons of signal flares and barrels of 60-proof whiskey. Moreover, the dangerous goods, in violation of all regulations, were located in close proximity.
Sodium chlorate NaClO3 (not to be confused with sodium chloride NaCl) is a powerful oxidizer, which, when in contact with organic compounds (which includes alcohol), can lead to an explosion and fire.
Shortly before the events described, the British Ministry of War Transport sent a letter to the management of the Canada Shipping Company, which indicated that the loading of ships in Canada violated British regulations for the carriage of dangerous goods, which, in particular, stated that:
"Not more than 10 tons of sodium chlorate may be stored in one hold; sodium chlorate must be kept away from explosives (such as flares) and must be separated by a compartment in the engine room; sodium chlorate must not be stored near any flammable materials."
The company's management probably did not attach much importance to this letter or simply ignored it. The main thing for them was the speed of loading, because "time is money." As a result, the port terminal workers responsible for loading the ship and its crew remained unaware of the danger of the cargo. This was also facilitated by the fact that more than 1700 barrels of sodium chlorate did not have the required labels warning of their dangerous contents.
In complete contravention of the Dangerous Goods Regulations, chemicals, rockets, whiskey, paper and other flammable cargo were stowed together in tween deck No. 3.
On March 6, one of the dockers noticed smoke rising from a stack of cargo in the corner of tweendeck No. 3. Attempts to fight the budding fire with fire extinguishers and a fire hose were unsuccessful.
The explosions occurred in the 3rd tween deck on the starboard side (the ship was moored with its port side to the berth). A powerful blast wave tore apart the steel bulkhead separating tween decks No. 2 and 3, tore out a piece of the starboard side and destroyed adjacent ship structures. The fire that broke out spread to a barge loaded with timber moored alongside.
Damage to the hold and tweendeck of the Green Hill Park
At the time, there were about a hundred people on board the ship: dockers, crew members, and shore specialists working in the engine room to repair the machinery. Six dockers and two sailors, whose cabins were above the explosion site, died instantly. Many were thrown overboard by the explosion or jumped into the water themselves, escaping from the explosions and fire.
The tugboats arrived quickly and began rescuing people in the water, evacuating them from the burning vessel and extinguishing the fire. They were joined by shore fire brigades. With great difficulty, the burning barge and a steamship moored at a nearby pier were towed away from the Green Hill Park.
As the fire in holds 2 and 3 blazed ever more fiercely, it was decided to tow the ship to a mudflat opposite the port. Volunteers had to be found to get the towing ropes in, willing to return to the burning steamer. According to their stories, the deck had already become almost unbearably hot.
Towing the burning Green Hill Park, showing damage to the starboard side.
However, the vessel clearly did not like the designated location and stubbornly refused to follow the tugs, describing intricate turns (probably the rudder blade was not in the center plane). Seeing the situation, the local naval leadership decided to take the burning steamer out of the port and sink it.
But the ship resisted this decision and, having described a full rotation, ran aground, from which it was with difficulty removed and finally taken out of the port and pushed onto the sandbank.
Fighting a fire at the beached Green Hill Park.
The fire was not extinguished until the following day, but the vessel's condition was assessed as "Constructive Total Loss", meaning that its repair was deemed economically unfeasible. As a result of this tragedy, in addition to the eight dead, another twenty-six people, including seven firefighters, were injured.
The option of dismantling the surviving steam engine and boilers and cutting up the hull for scrap metal was considered, but fate was kind to the long-suffering steamship. It was purchased by a Brazilian entrepreneur for only 9 percent of the original cost, and after repairs under the Panamanian flag and the name “Phaeax II”, the ship was put back into service. Changing owners, names and flags, the steamship served until 1968, when it was cut up “for needles” in Taiwan.
A multilateral commission was created to determine the causes of the disaster and find those responsible. Several versions of the causes of the emergency situation were put forward.
The theory of sabotage or diversion was quickly ruled out, and attention turned to the possible smoking of dockers in the ship's cargo holds, which was strictly prohibited, but, as the saying goes, "forbidden fruit is sweet." This accusation was rejected by both the cargo terminal administration and the dockers' union. As a weighty argument, the latter cited the decision of a recent union meeting. According to it, anyone caught smoking in prohibited areas was subject to a fine of $100 and immediate dismissal. A special duty officer, not engaged in other work, was appointed to monitor compliance with this ban.
It seemed that the investigation had reached a dead end, and so the commission moved on to the most probable version, in their opinion - a whiskey fire. The barrels of alcohol could have been opened either by dockers eager for alcohol, or damaged during loading, and then an accidental match or something similar, and ... But there was no direct evidence of this, not counting the dockers' overalls with sewn-in pockets with thermoses and food containers found in tween decks No. 2 and 3, possibly intended for carrying out stolen alcohol. But, contrary to this, it was believed that the cargo in the tween deck was packed so tightly that it was simply impossible to get to the coveted potion.
It should be noted that cargo theft in Canadian ports, and in Vancouver in particular, was quite common. Not only port employees of various ranks, but even local police and customs officers were usually involved.
Direct confirmation of this version appeared only 35 years after the events took place. In the early 1980s, a 91-year-old former Vancouver port dock worker told a local reporter a very remarkable story. historyAccording to her, in 1957, while a patient in the hospital, he got into a conversation with his dying roommate, also a former dockworker, a certain Joe. And he revealed to him the secret of the fire at Green Hill Park.
It turns out that a narrow passage to the coveted drink was already foreseen when the cargo was being stowed. And at one "wonderful" moment, when the whiskey was being poured, a heavily intoxicated loader decided to light the place and struck a match. Either the alcohol vapors that had accumulated in the confined space flared up, or the match fell into the spilled whiskey - a flame flared up, and the participants hurried to retreat, not only not trying to put out the fire, but also notifying about it.
The commission published its report on May 12, 1945, ten weeks after the incident. It specifically noted the explosiveness of sodium chlorate and the fumes of whiskey with a high alcohol content. The immediate blame for the incident was placed on the missing dock workers who had participated in the theft of the whiskey. But the Canada Shipping Company got away with it.
Sources of
1. John Stanton. The Green Hill Park Disaster.
2. Eve Lazarus.SS Greenhill Park: A Vancouver Tragedy.
3. Other resources
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