Port Pirie Wrecks

Fact Sheet No. 41

Port Pirie Ships’ Graveyard

Photographs and documentary evidence suggest that many vessels have been broken up and possibly abandoned in the waterways of Port Pirie. At this stage however, information about vessel remains is minimal.

Unidentified vessel – BHP Smelter Image: DEW Files Aerial photographs from the 1940s show an abandoned vessel (possibly a wooden barge) near the BHP smelter, while a 1992 photograph shows deteriorating wreckage of what is probably the same vessel.

Image: DEW Files

Wreck at Port Pirie, 1992 (note position of chimney) Aerial photograph of Port Pirie, 1945, showing vessel Smelter vessel Unidentified Iron Pontoon – River Bend A 1951 photograph shows an abandoned pontoon in Port Pirie, while a 1968 aerial photo reveals what is possibly the same vessel on a bank at the bend of the river.

Image courtesy: Ports Corp

Right: Aerial photograph of Port Iron pontoon, 1951 Pirie, 1968, showing iron pontoon Image courtesy: PortsCorp

Ketch Plank Point Myee The 54-ton wooden ketch Plank Point (1915) was Myee is believed to be the barge built at Goolwa in 1910, beached opposite Baltic Wharf in the late 1940s. In the but this has not been verified – some records conflate the late 1950s it was deliberately broken up and covered barge scrapped at Port Pirie with the ex-tug Myee, with dredging spoil during harbour development works. scuttled off Sydney in 1954.

No image available Barge No. 5 (ex-Grampus) The steel barge Grampus was built by the Government Iron Boiler – possibly the Dredge Tridacna Railways Workshop at Perth, Western Australia, and Photographs taken in 1992 show an iron boiler along the launched on 17 February 1900. The barge was purchased river. Although its origin is unknown, it has been by the Adelaide Steamship Company in 1906 and suggested that these remains may be associated with the transferred to Adelaide with the less memorable name dredge Tridacna which was broken up in Port Pirie in ‘Barge No. 5’. Surplus to requirements, the barge was sold 1966. in 1961. It was reportedly scuttled on 2 May 1962 and its register was closed In July the same year. Image: DEW Files Barge No. 7 (ex-Adelaide) The tug Adelaide was built by Hall, Russell & Co. Ltd at Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1877. Adelaide made the trip to South Australia under sail (apparently as a 3-masted barquentine), and had paddle wheels fitted after arrival at Port Adelaide on 30 July 1877. It was reputed to be the first Australian tug to be fitted with the new style surface condensing engine. Adelaide served the towage business at Port Adelaide and briefly at Port Pirie (where it was the first resident tug) until stripped and converted into a barge in 1905 on the arrival of the new tug Wato. Unromantically re-named 'No. 7', it served as a lighter at Iron boiler (Tridacna?), 1992 both Port Adelaide and Port Pirie until scrapped in 1958.

Image courtesy: State Library of South Australia Image courtesy: PortsCorp

Steam paddle tug Adelaide, c.1900 Dredge Tridacna, date unknown

Other vessels More information Department of Marine and Harbors records indicate that Heritage South Australia Hines Metals scrapped numerous vessels in Port Pirie Department for Environment and Water during the 1950s and 1960s. Whether these sites were GPO Box 1047, Adelaide SA 5001 completely cleared, or remains were abandoned on the Ph. (08) 8124 4960 bank, is unknown at this stage. Some of the known sites Email: [email protected] include: www.environment.sa.gov.au