Item 2009.10.2.011 - Japanese cruiser Izumo harbour accident at Vancouver, BC

• Graphic material

1 photograph : b&w ; 14 x 9 cm

Photograph depicts the Japanese cruiser Izumo and rescue boats in the harbour in Vancouver. Handwritten annotation below photograph reads, " Dragging for two drowned sailors and Jap squadron". On February 8, 1925 seventeen Japanese sailors drowned in Vancouver harbour when the motor launch pinnance in which they were returning from shore leave to the cruiser Idzumo collided with the Canadian Pacific tug Nanoose. The event is described in the New York Times on February 9, 1925: "The bodies of the officer, petty officers and five seamen have been recovered. Nine others are still missing. The men had been attending a dinner ashore and left the dock in the pinnace, which towed a ship's barge with eighty men in it. As the pinnace neared the three visiting Japanese cruisers, the Canadian Pacific tug with a car barge in tow, came up the harbor. Strong winds and currents prevailed and navigation with the tow was difficult. As the pinnace and car barge came together the tow line to the barge of men broke, thus saving the lives in that craft. Searchlights played on the scene of rescue all night, but outside of the eight men picked up, no more came to the surface. Today dragging operations to locate the pinnace have been conducted by boats of the fleet with four divers, three from the squadron and one provided by the Harbor Board, but up to the present the little steam carrier has not been hooked. A derrick stands by to lift the boat when located....In the meantime, dragging operations are being continued to locate the pinnace and men."