[Mike The Gas Man]

Hi Everyone!
Does anyone remember this incident back in 1970 ish? British Architect was tank cleaning in South China Sea off Philippines and she was struck by lightning. Her main deck was ripped apart in the resultant explosion! Ardlui was in the vicinity and rescued the crew!
Ardlui was in ballast and had sailed from Builders Yard in Japan on her maiden trip towards AG. Captain Cedric Ducker was the Master!
It was my last trip a Deck Cadet at the time!

Any info or photos would be great.
Regards, Mike.

[mpr41410]

The only thing I can remember about that incident involved the recovery of the ship, in itself a complex matter as I have a feeling she had been signed off as salvage.
The heresay (yarn?) that I recall was that the dashing chief engineering supt and ex spitfire pilot chartered a plane to view the ship to assess the damage and when the pilot wouldn't (or couldn't) get close enough yer man took the controls and made a really low pass.
At subsequent inaugurations of eng cadets he would recount this tale along with his spitfire exploits and on one occasion the dialogue dried up and a spotty oick from the floor piped up "tell us about the spitfires again".
Which went up like a lead balloon.
As I say hearsay, you might get a more informative answer if you asked on the british tankers section.