[CW] EG1NMP QRV 7-10 Jan. Commemorating 1966 Sinking of M/V Monte Palomares/EDMI in the North Atlantic. No SOS or MAYDAY was sent

[David J. J. Ring, Jr.]

Special event station EG1NMP will be on the air 7-10 January 
commemorating the 1966 sinking of M/V Monte Palomares/EDMI in the North 
Atlantic. No SOS or MAYDAY was sent, but "strange signals" during the 
radiotelegraph silence period (15-18 and 45-48 minutes of the hour) were 
heard by the alert Radio Officer, George MacCartney of Gloverville, NY 
on USA ship /SS Steel Maker /who heard these signals, informed his 
master, Ove V. Hulton of Succasunna, NJ who turned the ship towards 
Palomares/EDMI and rescues four men from a tiny wooden raft, USCGC 
ESCANABA later rescues 2 more.  Eleven (11) seamen (including the ship's 
master, Jose Gotta, perished onboard Palomares/EDMI when the vessel 
sunk, and the survivors witnessed their lifeboat with eighteen (18) 
seamen go likewise down with all hands in the rough seas.//

The station plans to work all bands and modes. SeeQRZ.co 
<https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2FQRZ.com%2F%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR2L75xsOKz3oMx93_wxv7xLn9v7E_cEiLUObbbygNgJh5A5j9ynwrbHVOM&h=AT3z8rfgGxQ4--UU23fv0vLhSBnq_zTH_g2ZrodDrsdaoAu8O0r3nxSidATmSKi4naH33Kq7Pa0XHdWggM_6RhBOPRH7z4CSUEn7hTFKMYHO4y107m-PNBmhAw&__tn__=-UK-y-R&c[0]=AT2zMxO_oZZ6fUki6lZdEMUmgl4PBis4wMUhvzfMtOqpq-tK7ty4XenjobEtS09gOd0L9ltyMTcsiup83jzZlPcijpDwNymINylhFNYrvlLaM-3qhnCLKJhZ40G3pO5YGONmDS-8nwID0ge0TOa9LntrUDb0w3frqPxb_qcEX4uKpBbH4ZusDlraS8LwQ_ZG1LMYduQZUj_rNGZVFujvWkj7GZ080wq_E_7QU7hFdC8_mOU>m 
for info, plus you can read a first-hand account of the Monte Palomares 
tragedy at the link below.


  1966: Monte Palomares

/On 10 January 1966, the Spanish freighter Monte Palomares sank in the 
North Atlantic, approximately 840 miles east northeast of Bermuda. Only 
six of the 38 crew were rescued./

//

/Fifty-two years later, one of those survivors, the ship’s electrician 
Manny González, was listening to his amateur radio at his home in 
Australia (his callsign is VK3DRQ). He heard the maritimeradio.org 
special event station ZM50GW 
<https://maritimeradio.org/in-distress/wahine/2018-zm50gw-wahine-50th-anniversary/> 
calling CQ and decided to respond. After some follow-up messages by 
email, he agreed to let maritimeradio.org publish his fascinating, 
first-hand account of the sinking of Monte Palomares./

The approximate location where Monte Palomares went down

/By Manolo González/

Manolo Gonzalez

There is a saying “A promise is a debt” and, as I would not want to be a 
debtor, I must tell my story as promised. First of all, I would like to 
make clear that my account of what happened more than fifty years ago is 
not a product of gossip or anything like that, but is the product of 
what I lived through and the memories that I carry with me.

I wish to do this because there are several friends and relatives of the 
victims of that tragedy, as well as my relatives, who often ask me to 
clarify for them, the things that by one means or another have been said 
or published and do not make much sense.

There are many things that I’ve read and heard about this incident that 
do not reflect the truth, perhaps misinterpreting the explanation that 
some of us, the six survivors, have given, or perhaps, that this pack of 
wolves in sheep’s clothing, calling themselves journalists, chose to 
make the drama more “striking” or appealing to the public for their own 
benefit, without thinking or caring about what the truth was or even who 
would be harmed by this behaviour.

I’ll mention as an example what one of many articles said: “Once the 
raft was overturned by those huge waves, these men had to turn the raft 
back over.” Who could think, with waves 30 to 45 feet (10 to 15 metres) 
high and with wind of 35-50 knots (data according to JC Carney of the 
United States Coast Guard and author of an article on that storm 
<https://web.archive.org/web/20160317015531/http://www.jacksjoint.com:80/storm.htm> 
who was also a crew member of one of the Coast Guard ships that 
participated in our rescue, /Escanaba/) that it would be possible to 
pick up the raft and turn it over as if it were a sheet of paper? 
Furthermore, that kind of raft does not need to be turned over, as it is 
identical on both sides.

On another occasion they wrote that the ship sank with all the lights 
turned on. If I had not been the ship’s electrician I might have 
believed that. Along with the boilermaker, we were the last to leave the 
engine room, and we did it precisely because all the generators had 
stopped, therefore, there was no electricity, neither was there any 
other light. We had to find our way up using our torches.

Another of many things, invented by those “characters” of the press that 
they portrayed as our words was that /Monte Palomares/ sank as a result 
of cargo shifting. Anyone who has the slightest notion of the type of 
ship that /Palomares/ was, and had seen with their own eyes how the 
grain was loaded in the United States, would not have the slightest 
doubt of the almost impossibility of such a thing. On the other hand, no 
one should believe that on such a ship, almost 150 metres long, sailing 
as she was like a submarine covered by those huge waves, would it be 
possible to know at that moment what was happening in the holds where 
the cargo was. No one, however brave he was, could possibly move around 
on deck without being carried away by those waves.

It was also published that we, the survivors, had been under pressure 
from Naviera Aznar, the company that owned the ship, to keep silent 
about what had occurred and as a result, the truth of what happened 
would never be known. I was present in all statements, press conferences 
both in Madrid as well as in the head office of Naviera Aznar and the 
insurance company. At no time did I feel any pressure, or fear, or any 
need to keep silent about what had happened. If there was a great 
pressure, it was precisely by those “characters” mentioned above, by 
insisting on convincing us that the truth was what they wanted to write, 
not what we had said. Nobody, I repeat, NOBODY could know what happened 
exactly.


      The ship

MV Monte Palomares/MV Monte Palomares/. Photo: JM Blánquez, baixamar.com

The 5973-ton /MV Monte Palomares/ was launched in 1961 at the shipyard 
of Euskalduna in Bilbao, Spain for the shipping company Naviera Aznar 
<http://www.theshipslist.com/ships/lines/aznar.shtml> of the same city. 
The ship was also registered there and allocated the callsign EDMI. It 
was 144 metres long and built for general cargo, with five holds having 
a capacity of more than 20,000 cubic metres of grain. The superstructure 
was almost at the stern, between the fourth and fifth holds.

Now I will recount events as I remember them.


      Into stormy seas

On January 5th 1966, with a crew of 38, /Monte Palomares/ sailed from 
Norfolk, Virginia with a cargo of 11,000 tonnes of maize, destined for 
Barcelona.

After January 6th, I remember that some of the crew murmured as they 
watched the sea “What a Christmas present,” referring to the bad weather 
that was observed.

The weather continued to worsen and the loaded ship resembled a 
submarine more than anything. This was not unusual for us in the North 
Atlantic; crossing was more problematic when we were in ballast, but 
well-loaded it was quite bearable and the ship was more stable.

Under these conditions we continued sailing until the morning of the 
10th, when we were about 840 miles east northeast of Bermuda. Due to a 
problem in the regulating fuel rod, the main engine stopped. I’m not 
very sure if that rod seized up or if it broke. I think it seized up, 
because it did not take long for the engineers to restart the main 
engine. What I do remember is that the rod regulating the fuel supply to 
the injectors shut off the fuel to these and caused the main engine to stop.

With the main engine stopped, the ship lost its forward movement and its 
steering, going broadside to the waves almost instantly and being hit by 
that raging sea. We felt a great blow on the ship’s side.

The ship had lost power, I think, for only a few minutes, and with power 
restored continued in the correct manner, but the ship was now slightly 
listing to starboard. The damage had already been done in so little time!

None of us knew what had happened in the holds, whose access for 
inspection was probing from the deck, that responsibility being met 
daily by the carpenter. Now, the ship being bucketed from side to side 
by those waves, perhaps about 18 metres high going as I said, like a 
submarine, only the “wise” journalists knew what happened. Because no 
one else could have known!

A ship of almost 150 metres in length, when the main engine is lost, 
does not have a way of being steered, and once drifting broadside on, 
the waves hit it as if it were a rock.

As the ship’s electrician, my main job was in the engine room where I 
went immediately from the first moment that the main engine stopped, 
around six o’clock in the morning. Once the fault was fixed and we got 
under way again and taking into account that the ship was now listing 
more with every passing minute; the transfer pumping of liquids between 
ballast tanks, trying to stabilise the ship, was done.


      Taking water

Given the inability to achieve this, the draining of water from the 
holds began. This draining, to our surprise, continued for most of the 
twelve hours the ship was fighting for its survival. Where was so much 
water coming from? This made us assume that the first big wave that hit 
the ship’s side had broken or cracked a side plate, allowing water 
access to the holds. This was only an opinion acquired by the 
circumstances, although impossible to verify, but much more logical than 
a shifting of the load, as the aforementioned “wise” wrote in their 
newspapers; we know what they are interested in!

I think it requires an explanation about the internal combustion 
engines. At the bottom of these engines is the crankcase, which contains 
the important oil for the internal lubrication. If for any reason the 
level of the oil is very low, there is a device that makes the engine 
stop to protect it. I must also clarify, that I am not nor have I been a 
mechanic, mine are just observations of what I learned there.

Because of the inclination and the movement that the waves gave us, the 
main engine, as well as the auxiliary ones, stopped by the 
aforementioned protection device, not for lack of oil, but because oil 
moved towards one or other side and that made the device “think” it was 
a lack of oil. The main engine would be started again, but the auxiliary 
engines, which were running the electricity generators, were more 
complicated. When the revolutions were down so was the voltage, which 
made the switchboard distribution panel circuit breakers disconnect and 
with them all starting systems of the draining pumps. And of course we 
were running out of light.

The boilermaker, Román Murga, was responsible for restarting the 
auxiliary engines. Once the correct voltage was achieved I would 
reconnect the main circuit breakers and immediately start the draining 
pumps and everything else necessary, such as the air compressor which 
was needed for engine starting.

So we continued at that pace most of the day until about mid-afternoon 
when the ship’s list was so pronounced that the main engine could not be 
started again; so we kept repeating the above with the auxiliary 
engines. For this task, Mr Murga and I were the only people required, so 
the rest of the engine room staff went upstairs.

It may have been about five o’clock in the afternoon when the stopped 
engines were not able to start again. Yes, we tried many times, but the 
inclination was too great and there was not a chance to accomplish it.

Then Mr Murga and I decided, our way out lit only by our torches, to 
take the difficult journey towards the top deck which was about three 
levels high, the stairs almost impossible to climb, and trying to help 
Mr Murga which still made it more difficult; once out of the engine 
room, we went through our cabins which were almost filled with water, to 
take our lifejackets and helping Mr Murga to walk which was not easy 
with the decks almost upright and horizontal walls.

We continued to the next floor from where there was the exit to the rear 
deck and the water looked like a river coming along the corridor, there 
we found Juan Rotaeche, the chief engineer who, having perceived that Mr 
Murga and I had not left, was coming for us. He asked where we had been 
and we said we were trying to keep the auxiliary engines running. To his 
question of why we did not leave the engine room when the “abandon ship” 
signal was given, we replied that we had not heard such a signal – the 
truth!

After those few words we continued the three of us towards the deck and 
when we asked about the lifeboats, the chief engineer said that they had 
both gone. The deck was almost upright; the waves were smashing against 
the deck as if to take us. Clinging to what we could we started to climb 
towards the port side which was all that was still above water, I got up 
there first but Mr Murga, even being helped by the chief engineer, could 
not climb. I was eager to turn back to try to help them, but the chief 
engineer shouted out at me, “do not back up”. I continued to the stern, 
where we believed the life rafts would be.

The ship was still struggling and refusing to go under the water. The 
cold, rain and wind seemed hellish as I kept slithering myself on the 
port side towards the stern. At a small distance, to my surprise, I 
found my friend, neighbour and the ship’s fourth engineer, Jose Gil, 
known in my town of Bueu as “Pepe de Erundina.”

The part of the ship where we were, Pepe and I, would be half the 
distance towards the stern, almost at the end of the fifth hold. 
Suddenly that part went under water for a while, coming back up with us 
still clinging tightly. I heard in the distance the shouting of Román 
Murga and the chief engineer, giving me the impression that the water 
had already taken them.

My friend Pepe told me not to go to the stern, since he was already 
coming from there and the rafts were no longer in their place, adding 
with fearful voice “what can we do next my friend?” to which, with no 
less fear, I replied “the ship is sinking, if we continue here we’ll go 
down with her, we have to throw ourselves into the water.”

We did that, swimming next to each other for a few minutes trying to get 
away from the ship, or else she would engulf us. As we swam, we thought 
we saw a flash and heard a sound like a lot of air pressure coming out 
of the funnel. After that, a wave separated us and that was the last I 
heard of my friend Pepe.


      Battle for survival

In that awful darkness of night, not knowing which way I was going and 
ignoring where the rest of the crew would be, I was filled with fear and 
sadness, but inside me, despite everything, I had great hope even 
though, when at times instead of breathing air I swallowed water and 
there were few opportunities in which I was breathing air.

After a while – it seemed like long hours – I found a crowded raft and 
the occupants helped me aboard. I began to feel safe, but I soon 
realised that a raft with little weight in the middle, in that kind of 
sea, would soon be easily beaten by the waves and throw us scattered in 
all directions. The sad and bitter reality is that every time that 
happened, those who still had the energy or simply the luck, or whatever 
you want to call it, were able to return to the raft; the first to 
arrive helped the next to get on board. But sometimes there were just a 
few minutes until another treacherous wave appeared.

After a long time in these conditions, we came across the other 
liferaft, loaded with people and close enough to be able to exchange 
words. We were so close that they wanted to transfer some of their 
people to our raft as we had fewer people on board. But, being unable to 
manoeuvre, soon we were separated again by another wave.

Of all those vicissitudes, the one that stuck with me was that, one of 
the many times our raft was turned upside down, as I wanted to get out 
of the water, I bumped my head on the bottom of the raft, so I was 
beneath it. Not knowing exactly what I was doing I kept pushing up 
desperate for air, until it occurred to me to swim to the side and came 
to the surface, I was already without courage or strength, but 
colleagues helped me to get on board.

These liferafts had two tubular semicircles, made of aluminium I think, 
to the shape of the letter “D” held by the two points, one at each end 
that when pulled would bring like a plastic awning behind it which 
should serve to cover us. We used them once or twice and very soon they 
were blown to smithereens by the force of the sea and wind.

When the rafts were installed a few months before, I, perhaps by my 
curiosity, had noticed that they were divided into several sections, 
some with candies and food, others with clean water and one of them with 
flares; all properly identified and sealed with plastic tape that had to 
be pulled to access the contents. I explained to my colleagues that we 
had to be careful not to open any section until the moment that its 
contents were needed, because once opened, if the raft overturned, we 
could lose everything.

I remember in the ship, occasional “abandon ship” drills were done, but 
always with the boats, not with the rafts, or at least that’s my 
recollection.


      Help arrives

After a few hours in that state of rollovers and knocks of the waves, at 
about four in the morning, one of us said he saw a light, but with so 
much uncontrolled movement we could not tell which direction it was. We 
remained vigilant, however, and again, sometime later there appeared a 
light from a ship.

SS Steel Maker/SS Steel Maker/

We knew before leaving the ship, that /SS Steel Maker/ 
<http://www.isthmianlines.com/ships/sm_steel_maker.htm> was coming 
towards us, but we were told it would come at dawn. Once we were 
convinced that the light came from a ship, we opened the section of the 
raft containing the flares and fired some into the air.

Even now, more than fifty years after the events, writing about that 
moment is for me extremely moving. The light we had seen was coming 
slowly closer until we could actually see the /Steel Maker/.

The ship positioned herself to protect us and give us shelter. The crew 
threw a net on the same side so that when we were closer we could climb 
on board.

Sometimes we were so close that we could almost touch the hull, but due 
to high waves, sometimes we separated a lot and when the ship could 
again get closer we, one by one climbed up to the deck of that saviour 
ship. I think the first to climb up was the sailor Avelino Campo and the 
first cook Santiago Uriaguereca.

For my part, I started the climb but would have been halfway up when the 
little remaining strength I had evaporated, and there I fell, hanging by 
a leg from the net, thereafter being helped aboard by one of the 
American crew.

The apprentice engineer, my friend Miguel Echeandía, could not even 
start the climb. If I remember properly, from the same raft he fell into 
the water and one of the American crew had to go down to pick him up and 
get him aboard.

I had my chin bloodied by chafing of the lifejacket and my mouth full of 
sores from the salt water. That wonderful crew of /Steel Maker/ first 
thing they did, was to give us dry and clean clothes, something hot to 
drink with Spanish brandy and as soon as we could answer, they began 
asking us about the rest of the crew of /Monte Palomares/.

We told them what we knew and they continued searching for more 
survivors, but that was like looking for a needle in a haystack. The 
next day, although visibility was not favourable, one aircraft from the 
Lajes Air Force Base in the Azores, which participated in the search, 
claimed to see only a few lifejackets and something green with yellow 
stripes, asking us if we knew what it was and we told them that they 
were empty oil drums that we had on the stern deck.


      Second raft spotted

In the afternoon a US Coast Guard ship called /Escanaba/ received from a 
plane the coordinates where they had seen a raft containing three people.

US Coast Guard ship Escanaba/Escanaba/. Photo: US Coast Guard

/Escanaba/ headed to that point and when they were near, the plane began 
to circle and drop flares to signal the the precise location. Once 
there, they found second engineer Ignacio Bravo Bereincua, waiter Santos 
Camino García and the body of third engineer José Silva Currás.

According to these two survivors, like /Steel Maker/, /Escanaba/ gave 
the rescued sailors everything they could need, and both were very thankful.

Shortly after the rescue, /Escanaba/, having been 30 days at sea and 
running low on fuel, departed for Argentia, Newfoundland. She was 
relieved in the search by the /Barataria/, also from the US Coast Guard.

/Steel Maker/ and other vessels and planes continued to search for 
survivors without success, until the Coast Guard terminated the search a 
few days later. Then we learned with great sorrow that 32 of the crew, 
our friends, had lost their battle against the sea. There were only six 
survivors from /Monte Palomares/.

The port of destination of /Steel Maker/ was New York and we were taken 
there, being greeted by the Ambassador of Spain.

Monte Palomares survivorsFour survivors of Spanish freighter /MS Monte 
Palomares/ are greeted by Spain’s consul general in New York, Manuel 
Albart, on their arrival in New York City. L-R: Avelino Campo from 
Santander (sailor), Manuel González from Bueu (electrician), Ove Hultin 
(Master of rescue ship SS Steel Maker), Mr Albart, Miguel Echeandía from 
Bilbao (apprentice engineer) and Santiago Uriaguereca from Bermeo (chief 
cook). UPI Telephoto

Once provided with safe conduct we flew to Madrid where we met with the 
other two survivors, Santos Camino and Ignacio Bravo. From them we 
learned the reason for their rescue so much later than ours. They had 
opened the flares’ section too soon and in one of those many rollovers 
lost them.

After all the rigorous comprehensive statements, we could finally, each 
of us, head home. Three months later I embarked on /Monte Peñalara/.

A US $1 note given to the author by Charlie, one of the crew of the 
rescue ship Steel MakerA US $1 note given to the author by Charlie, one 
of the crew of the rescue ship /Steel Maker/


      In appreciation

My heartfelt thanks to the entire crew of /SS Steel Maker/, especially 
the one from Puerto Rico who was translating between our Spanish 
language and English; for all that human kindness they showed us and 
thanks to them, today I can tell all of this.

Thanks also to /Escanaba/, although they did not participate in my own 
rescue, they did so in that of my colleagues.

To Mr JC Carney because, thanks to him, we know more details through his 
writing entitled /One Hell of a Storm/ 
<https://web.archive.org/web/20160317015531/http://www.jacksjoint.com:80/storm.htm>.

To all, many thanks.

© Manolo González
Blackburn, Australia
July 2016

------------------------------------------------------------------------


      The survivors

The six survivors of the Monte Palomares sinkingThe six survivors of the 
Monte Palomares, photographed at the shipping company’s office in 
Madrid, L-R: Avelino Campos, Ignacio Bravo, Santos Camino, Manuel 
González, Santiago Uriaguereca and Miguel Echeandía


      Those who died

Anastasio Aberasturi (Carpenter)
Ramiro Amarella (EDH)
Julián Arrizubieta (Chief Steward)
Lizardo Barbeito (AB)
Juan Brianes (EDH)
Francisco Cal (Greaser)
José Gil Castro (4th Engineer)
Domingo Crespo (EDH)
Pío Cribeiro (Deck Cadet)
José Silva Currás (3rd Engineer)
José Luis de la Riva (Greaser)
Francisco Díaz (Chief Mate)
Juan Duserm (Waiter)
Iván Fernández (2nd Mate)
Jacobo Fiuza (Greaser)
Antonio García (EDH)
José Goitia (Master)
Antonio González (Greaser)
Francisco González (Waiter)
Marcelino González (Kitchen Hand)
Pedro Gorroño (1st Radio Officer)
Modesto Lamensa (Greaser)
Juan Bautista Luaces (Kitchen Hand)
Francisco Marimón (3rd Mate)
Hilario Martínez (EDH)
Román Murga (Boilermaker)
José Oliveira (AB)
Antonio Rementería (Boatswain)
Jesús Rementería (Apprentice Engineer)
Manuel Ríos (AB)
Manuel Romero (AB)
Juan F Rotaeche (Chief Engineer)

news report on rescued sailorsThe Leader-Herald, Gloversville-Johnstown, 
NY. 17 Jan 1966, p 16


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