["Western Australia", The Argus (Melbourne), Tuesday 29 March 1881, page 6]
WESTERN AUSTRALIA.
From Our Own Correspondent.
...
Since I last wrote the north west coast has been visited by a fearful storm, which has caused much destruction of property. Mr John Brockman, a gentleman engaged in pearling pursuits lately sent a graphic account of the disaster to the West Australian and from his description it would appear that a worse willy-willy, as these north-west tornadoes are locally called, has never been known, even in a region where they are very frequent and very severe Mr Brockman says that he, with some 12 other pearling vessels, was operating on the Mary Ann patch, near North west Cape, when indications of a storm coming on, he deemed it advisable to take refuge in the mangrove creeks. He lay-to in a position which he considered one of absolute safety, the other boats being all close at hand. This was in the morning, and by midday the wind had risen to a fearful hurricane, and a blackness had settled down upon them so dense that they could only see a few yards ahead. Their anchors began to drag, and finally they were washed by the force of the waves and wind into the narrows of the creek, where they were kept grinding upon the mangroves in the most uncomfortable and alarming way. At this time they could detect the tops of the mangroves waving some dozen feet above their heads. Suddenly there was a great lurch and roll, the water came up along the deck to the combing of the main hatch, but the vessel soon righted, and the crew noticed that the mangroves had completely disappeared A few minutes afterwards the vessel gave another roll, and capsized. Mr Brockman and his men clung to the wreck until 5 o'clock p.m., when there was a sudden lull, the centre of the cyclone having probably been reached. They then scrambled on shore, where they found O'Grady, the captain of another pearler, which had also been completely wrecked. Before long the hurricane came on again, and the party was obliged hastily to seek the hills for shelter. Here they passed a wretched night, and in the morning found that only one of the 12 vessels which, 21 hours before, had been riding at anchor together, had escaped complete destruction.
Mr. Robert Sholl, another pearler, who brought the tale of the disaster to Fremantle, states that on sailing down the coast he found that a complete transformation had taken place in the appearance of the country. Whole tiers of sandhills had been washed away, some of which had been as much as 50ft, in height, and at the back of where these hills had formerly been water covered the ground for miles inland. Sharks, turtle, and fish were stranded high and dry some distance from the shore, and there was every indication of the action of an immense tidal wave. Although the darkness was too complete to enable him to judge otherwise than by inference, Mr Brockman is convinced that it was a wave of this kind that lifted him over the mangroves, and afterwards capsized him in so inexplicable a way. The loss of life occasioned by this terrible disaster was, fortunately, not so great as might have been expected. Only three Europeans perished, the number of native divers who were drowned has not been correctly ascertained, but was not, I believe, very large.
