John BLISSETT, Ken, Noreen & Ronnalee JONES,
John BLISSETT, Ken, Noreen & Ronnalee JONES,
Alan NICHOL, Michael CALVIN
Ken Jones, above
Gender
Circumstances
John Blissett, 23 years old, was last seen on 5 November 1988 aboard vessel 'Patanela'. The yacht left Portland, Victoria on 1 November 1988. The vessel was headed for Airlie Beach in Queensland. There was a radio message on 8 November giving its location as 10 miles east of Botany Bay. No further sightings of the yacht or contact with the crew members has been made.
Fears are held for the safety of those on board. Anyone with information which may assist in locating the whereabouts of John are urged to anonymously contact Crime Stoppers on their website or free call 1800 333 000.
THE steel-hulled yacht was surging across the Great Australian Bight under clear skies and a full moon with a "good wind and a huge swell right up the bum", penned Michael Calvin in a letter to his twin sister, Sue.
It was October 26, 1988 and life was one great adventure for the 21-year-old from Taree and his mate John Blissett, crewmen aboard the 20-metre luxury schooner Patanela. They had been 10 days at sea, sailing out of Fremantle bound for the Whitsundays. Next port of call was Port Lincoln, where Mr Calvin would post his letter, before a series of stops on the way to Airlie Beach, where the pair had been promised use of the boat for a charter business.
There was even time for Christmas back home before launching their future, he wrote: "Myself and John will then drive, fly or bus back to Taree for Chrissie, maybe two weeks then make our way back to start up a charter business onboard." And then, an intriguing postscript: "We have just made a message in a bottle for a free holiday onboard the Patanela."
But his sister never saw her brother again. He vanished - along with Mr Blissett and a Perth couple, Ken and Noreen Jones, who were also on board when the boat disappeared without trace off Sydney a few weeks after the letter was posted. What happened remains a mystery.
Sheryl Waideman, her husband, Gary, and her brother Doug had driven to the beach near Eucla on the West Australian-South Australian border for a swim before indulging in their passion for beachcombing. Ms Waideman headed one way and the men the other.
The beach is so remote that it has no name and the only sound above the ocean is an occasional crayfish boat. There is no sign of human activity so Ms Waideman was taken aback when she found a Bacardi bottle half-buried upside down in the sand. Inside she could see a note, the writing clearly visible.
Rather than opening it on the beach, she took the bottle back to their campsite where the three judged it, because of its good condition, to be a couple of years old. It was only after returning home to the town of Esperance, nine hours away by car, that they carefully removed the note.
Written in pale blue-green ink, it read: "Hi there. Out here in the lonely Southern Ocean and thought we would give away a free holiday in the Whitsunday Islands in north Queensland, Australia. Our ship is travelling from Fremantle, Western Aust, to Queensland to work as a charter vessel." The note invited the finder to call one of a pair of phone numbers for John and Mick to claim the prize and gave the yacht's position just off Eucla. "See ya soon", it ends, signed John.
"When we read the date it blew us away," Ms Waideman recalled this week. "I had no idea about the Patanela. In fact we jokingly tried phoning one of the numbers just to see if it was still working. It was only after we searched on the internet that we realised what had happened, which was very upsetting considering they disappeared only a week or so later."
After several weeks she decided to track down Mr Blissett's parents. She phoned on January 24.
"I was sewing with the phone right next me," Marj Blissett recalled. "The woman at the other end said something like, 'This is going to sound very strange and you don't know me but' and then told me the story. I was flabbergasted."
She called her husband, Brian, who was out the back: "He was calm and collected, I think because he couldn't quite believe it. It was only a few days later after Sheryl emailed a photograph of the note that he accepted it was true. We recognised the handwriting immediately."
The importance of the discovery is not that it proves what happened, but what did not occur in the early hours of November 8 about 10 nautical miles off Botany Bay. Authorities believe the most likely scenario is that the boat was struck and sunk by a freighter but that has not stopped a series of rumours being circulated over the years, particularly after one of the boat's life buoys was hauled aboard by a fisherman off Terrigal seven months later.
Dozens of sightings have been reported, from Australia to South-East Asia and South America, and theories have included rumours that Mr Blissett and Mr Calvin may have been involved in hijacking the boat. An inquest in 1992 returned an open finding but the now-retired NSW deputy coroner, Derrick Hand, said he was satisfied that the yacht had sunk and all on board had died.
Marj Blissett says the discovery of the bottle and its message proves her son was innocent. "It supports our belief that the boys were there for no other reason than adventure and their intention was to start a charter operation," she said. "We never believed anything else."
Michael Calvin's mother, Dawn, was at South West Rocks when she got a call from Mrs Blissett about the discovery: "It was upsetting at first because it brings back memories but I've settled down now and really happy it's been found. How amazing."
Her son's letter to his sister only confirms its authenticity, she said: "I've endured a lot of calls over the years. It's been hurtful and now we know the truth."
Ms Waideman wants to take it a step further. Next month she intends travelling to Taree to return John Blissett's note to his mother. "It belongs to her. It's her son."
Mrs Blissett says she is moved by the offer: "This is a lovely thing to happen. Now we'll have something of John."
The ship was the Patanela, a twin-masted, steel-hulled schooner on its way to North Queensland with four people on board. Not a trace of them has ever been found.
Under Investigation gathered a panel of some of this country's greatest maritime experts - retired Submarine Commander John Dikkenberg, world renowned yachtswoman and lawyer Adrienne Cahalan, author and investigator Robert Reid who spent years investigating the Patanela and former Victorian Search and Rescue commander Ian Veitch who has conducted dozens of searches at sea.
A coronial inquest determined the Patanela was the victim of a hit and run collision, probably with a much larger tanker and was forced to the bottom of the sea with all hands on board.
It's a finding UI's panel of experts doubt with alternate theories being debated including hijack, a murder-suicide or a different accident scenario which saw the crew in a life boat in worsening conditions who eventually drowned at sea.
And to add to the mystery a retired police officer broke a 30 year silence to detail the sighting of a ship he is certain was the Patanela.
The Patanela was hand built in the mid 1950's in Tasmania, the first steel-hulled ship of its kind constructed there and one of the rarest vessels in the country.
It had a spectacular career ferrying scientific teams to the Antarctic, operating as a crayfishing vessel in some of the toughest and roughest seas, before being bought by a wealthy West Australian businessman who planned to use the boat as a tourist charter in North Queensland.
The vessel was equipped with the latest technology, colour radar and anti collision and completely refitted for its voyage from Fremantle to Airlie Beach.
"It was about as unsinkable as you could get with a steel vessel," Robert Reid told Ui.
"It was a robust, steel, 75-foot schooner and had proved to be a well-founded, seagoing large yacht," Submariner John Dikkenberg noted.
The delivery captain was Ken Jones who was joined by his wife Noreen for the trip. Two young deckhands from country New South Wales, John Blissett and Michael Calvin also signed on.
It was meant to be a routine journey but ended in doom and mystery.
On October 16, 1988 the Patanela set out from Fremantle bound for Queensland.
On board the four crew who were joined by Alan Nicol the owner and the skipper's daughter Ronnalee Jones. They would stay for part of the journey.
For most of the early part of the trip there was no indication anything was wrong.
Halfway across the Great Australian Bight the two young crew members penned a letter in a bottle inviting whoever found their message to join them for a holiday in Queensland. All seemed happy, ship shape.
"Out here in the lonely Southern Ocean and thought we would give away a free holiday in the Whitsunday Islands in north Queensland". The note read signed by John Blissett.
But about the same time skipper Ken Jones received a distressing call from his son in Perth. Jones' yacht The Fremantle Doctor had been repossessed and his business was facing massive financial problems.
This was the first hint of any trouble on this trip and immediately raised red flags for UI's panel of experts.
John Dikkenberg, alert to the moods of crew in submarines, noted:
"My entire reading of Ken Jones was that at the very least, he was under a lot of pressure."
Dikkenberg also noted Jones, an experienced deep water sailor and yachtsman, had spent vast amounts of time motoring during his voyage, not using the schooner's sails.
He wondered if Jones' financial pressures have caused more emotional distress than anyone knew and eventually led to a break down and murder suicide on board.
"And this would explain to me why a really well-founded mariner, someone with thousands of sea miles, a good mariner in every respect, just went to sea in a very depressed state," he said.
As the Patanela approached Portland in Victoria only Ken Jones, his wife and the two crewmen were on board. Owner Alan Nicol had disembarked in Esperance, Ronnalee Jones in Port Lincoln, South Australia.
Then strangely upon arrival Jones rang the boat's owner requesting $500 for fuel which bizarrely he didn't purchase.
This raised concerns with UI's panel.
"That seems a bit strange that if he's motoring across the Great Australian Bight, if he's asked for money, it means that he wants the fuel. But it just adds to the mystery of why he didn't and he requested the money and been given the money," former Search and Rescue boss Ian Veitch told UI.
The Patanela, re-stocked with some supplies but no extra fuel continued on its voyage.
On November 7th the ship was seen motoring past a lighthouse in Jervis Bay, south of Sydney.
And in the early hours of the morning of November 8th the Patanela arrived off the coast of Botany Bay.
But there was a problem.
At two and a half minutes to one, OTC (Overseas Telecommunication Commission), which managed all messages and radio calls from ships, received a message from skipper Ken Jones.
Recorded tapes reveal these messages:
KEN JONES: SYDNEY RADIO - SYDNEY RADIO SYDNEY RADIO THIS IS PATANELA PATANELA PATANELA ON CHANNEL 16 DO YOU READ?
OTC: PATANELA, SYDNEY GOOD MORNING LOUD AND CLEAR OVER.
KEN JONES: PATANELA - I BELIEVE WE'VE RUN OUT OF FUEL, WE'RE APPROXIMATELY 10 MILES EAST OF BOTANY BAY.
KEN JONES: WE'VE HOISTED OUR SAILS AND WE'RE TACKING OUT TO THE EAST - SO TRACKING ABOUT 080
Running out of fuel - having motored for the majority of the voyage - stunned the panel of experts, but also the words where Ken Jones claimed he "thought" he'd run out of fuel perplexed them.
"I would've thought that if you're going to run out of fuel, you keep sailing and you save whatever fuel you've got," John Dikkenberg told the panel.
"if he's running out of fuel, you would sail and save that fuel for when you did need it. And to say I think I've run out of fuel, you think he'd be experienced enough to know whether he has run out of fuel or not, " Ian Veitch added.
Veteran yachtswoman Adrienne Cahalan believed Jones may just have been distracted.
"So that he mightn't have been on his game and then not taking on the fuel. It might have been a risk that he took that he might have thought, "Oh well I'll get it in Eden." And then he got to Eden thought, "Oh no, I'll make it to Sydney, it'll be okay." And that gamble didn't pay off, "she said.
In that same message to OTC, Ken Jones also indicated he might need assistance entering Sydney Harbour the next morning - another call which intrigued our panel.
But if this first message was unusual, a second an hour later totally baffled UI's panel of experts.
KEN JONES: How far South is Moruya ?
We're unfamiliar with that position.
How far South is it in miles from us ?
"I have no explanation. I have no idea why you would make that first call to say I'm east of Botany Bay and then asking for directions to Moruya. He'd know where he is," John Dikkenberg said.
"That is very strange, that is probably the strangest thing of everything," Adrienne Cahalan added.
A third short message then static .
KEN: 300 KS SOUTH……IS IT SOUTH? …. STATIC
Then silence and the Patanela is never heard from again.
The unusual nature of the OTC radio calls led author and investigator Robert Reid to believe foul play was involved.
Reid, who investigated the disappearance for years, maintains to this day the Patanela was hijacked by a third party who boarded the vessel, or by the two young crewmen on board.
Coincidentally, John Blissett and Michael Calvin had worked on the Australian movie "Dead Calm" , a chilling story of a yacht being hijacked.
Robert Reid believed there were too many coincidences.
"When you look at the so-called coincidence that they'd been talking about that. Then Calvin turns up in Fremantle and talks his way onto the Patanela. Then Blisset turns up, two old mates, and he gets on board as well. So they turn up on Patanela and she goes missing."
John Blissett's mother Marj refuted that theory out of hand.
"They wouldn't. They were not like that. They knew what was right and what was wrong in life. This was not something they would do," she said.
And there was nothing in their actions leading up to the disappearance which indicated the boys intended piracy and hijack. Their carefree message in a bottle seems to show they were having a good time.
A Coroner ruled the Patanela was the victim of a sudden sinking after a massive collision with another vessel, most likely a much larger tanker.
Dozens of ships were investigated, but only one, a 43,000 tonne bulk carrier, the Howard Smith, was anywhere near the Patanela at the time.
Howard Smith crew members told Federal Police they did not see the smaller vessel on radar nor heard a collision and there was no sign of any impact with another ship.
What mystified UI's panel of experts was the complete lack of any debris.
"With any search, you usually find some debris, something to indicate either an accident or something that's floated from the vessel when it sank. In this, there's just nothing," Ian Veitch noted.
Nothing was found until almost six months later when a life buoy, clearly marked as Patanela's was located off the coast of Terrigal north of Sydney.
Adrienne Cahalan, using weather and tidal data from that time, concluded any debris would have been washed out to sea. And with a search not being instigated for 11 days after the disappearance the likelihood of finding anything else was remote.
Australia's Ghost Ship, the Patanela was sighted dozens of times after that ill-fated night.
All were investigated and only one seemed credible.
Retired New South Wales police officer Ted McCarthy and his wife saw a vacht matching the Patanela in March 1989, months after the disappearance.
Armed with a magazine article with a picture of the Patanela, McCarthy compared the picture with the boat using his binoculars.
He remained convinced he was witnessing the missing schooner.
" I identified a number of points, things like it had square portholes, which was a bit unusual. It was blue, the colour was all exactly the same, the rigging was the same. The wheelhouse down the back of the boat was as, per the picture. And up the front on the bowsprit area, there was plaited rope which was quite noticeable and quite obvious, and it was on the Patanela," Ted McCarthy detailed to UI.
He radioed the vessel asking for identification and whoever was onboard denied the ship was the Patanela.
If it was, it hoisted anchor later that evening and disappeared for all time.
At least three of UI's panel of experts are convinced human intervention was behind the disappearance of the Patanela - whether hijack by persons unknown, by the crew members or the captain himself.
But Adrienne Cahalan holds a completely different view - that the ship was involved in an accident at sea and the crew were claimed in a lifeboat in worsening ocean conditions.
Regardless of their differences they all agree the Patanela mystery, Australia's most famous Ghost Ship, may never be solved.