INSIDE PASSAGE AND TIME OF FOUNDERING CONFIRMED.

Taken from previous post:

'residents at Canon Valley Beach saw her

pass there just as darkness was setting in

and the night promising to be a very stormy

one'.

This is a revealing report. Most of the literature claims that Yongala was last sighted off Dent Island by the keeper and after that no further evidence pointing to Captain Knight electing to use the inside or outside passage. If this report is accurate it confirms without a fraction of a doubt that Captain Knight used the inside passage. The route directly out to sea (outside passage) as depicted on the image below would have taken Yongala away from any vantage point of vision within Canon Valley.

Sunset 23 March, Queensland, is 5:56 pm. Yongala was alleged to have passed Dent Island at 6:30 pm. Yongala would then have steamed another 13 n miles in roughly an hour to be sighted off Canon Valley = 7:30 pm, well after dark!  What can we make of this? Either the report was false or there is more to this than meets the eye...

We know that Dent Island is roughly 53 n miles from Mackay. If Yongala departed Flat-Top at 1:40 pm and made her average speed of 14 knots she should have been sighted off Dent Island at 5:30 pm NOT 6:30 pm. This would then correlate with the sighting from Canon Valley at roughly 6:30 pm which would more accurately account for the statement 'as darkness was setting in'.

If this is the case, then we must take the calculations further. Maintaining 14 knots Yongala should have reached her final position by 12:30 am, 24 March. Let's say for argument's sake Captain Knight pushed Yongala, attempting to outrun a storm he believed was coming up from the south, he could have maintained about 16 knots which would give us an arrival time at Yongala's final position +/- 11:45 pm, 23 March - the distance covered from Dent Island, via the north side of Holbourne Island, to Yongala's final position is about 100 n miles. (see:  http://yongalarevisited.blogspot.co.za/2016/10/deep-water.html)

If this final calculation is true there is a fascinating correlation. A chronometer was discovered at the Yongala wreck site which stopped working when Yongala foundered. After some interpretation (Queensland time vs. Greenwich Meantime) a conclusion was reached that Yongala foundered at 11.45 pm, 23 March according to the chronometer reading. This and the report above would substantiate three things:

- Yongala was sighted by the keeper off Dent Island at 5:30 pm, not 6:30 pm, 23 March.

- Captain Knight used the inside passage.

- Captain Knight, pushing the Yongala at an average of 16 knots, was trying to outrun a storm system he believed was coming up from the south rather than steaming as fast as he could into the centre of a cyclone!

See the following for more information on the chronometer:

www.academia.edu/3991909/Viduka_A._and_Muliava_V._2007_To_capture_time_a_conservation_approach