DECEMBER 18TH. - LOWESTOFT, SUFFOLK.

At 3.50 in the afternoon the coastguard telephoned that the motor vessel Esso Ottawa, of Liverpool, was drifting towards the Newcombe Sands. She was a tanker of 900 tons and had a crew of eight. An easterly gale was blowing, with a rough sea.

The motor life-boat Michael Stephens was launched at 4.12. Her coxswain was absent on account of illness, following the arduous service of fourteen hours to the Helping Hand the previous night. The life-boat arrived to find the tanker on the sands a mile southsouth- east of Lowestoft firing distress signals.

She was rolling heavily, but the life-boat went alongside and took off her crew. She landed them at 4.30. Later the Esso Ottawa was brought in by a tug. - Rewards, £12 16s. 6d..