SAHRA Maritime and Underwater Cultural Heritage
March 13:
“This day in our shipwreck and aeronautical wreck history”
1826: Harmony, this British brig wrecked at Needles Point by the Knysna Heads in the Western Cape.
1839: Shylock, this wooden sailing cutter wrecked on a reef off Dassen Island off the west coast in the Western Cape.
1879: A strong north easterly gale claimed two vessels in Durban in KwaZulu-Natal:
• Gazelle, this wooden sailing brig wrecked on Back Beach after its cables parted,
• Liba/Ziba/Zeba, this sailing schooner’s cables parted, and it was driven onto the bar at the harbour and then Back Beach where it wrecked.
1953: Falken Outspan, this steam-powered whaler wrecked south of Robben Island in Table Bay in the Western Cape. It was being towed by the Carmen from Saldanha Bay when both vessels ran aground on Robben Island, but the Carmen was refloated whilst the Falken Outspan could not, and it was considered lost.
1967: Rietbok, this SAA Vickers Viscount (registration no. ZS-CVA), a public transport aircraft, wrecked in the ocean whilst approaching East London, in the Eastern Cape during flight SA406. All 20 passengers and five members of the crew were lost.
Daily Dispatch article on the wrecking of the SAA Rietbok (1967)
This wrecking event was shrouded in controversy with various reports emerging over the years, claiming that the loss of the aircraft was a political tactic to assassinate two vocal opponents of the Apartheid regime, Johannes Bruwer who was the acting chair of the Afrikaner Broederbond at the time, and Audrey Rosenthal, an American woman who assisted exiled PAC and ANC family members through the Defense and Aid Fund.
Die Burger article on the wrecking of the SAA Rietbok (1967)
However, several expert investigators have stated over the years that the loss was most likely accidental, owing to a once-off, or a combination of, several unfortunate circumstances. As the incident occurred late at night, in an area with strong currents and a rapidly dropping ocean depth starting at 60 m, recovery attempts were unsuccessful.
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