A 65-year quest to find World War II warship HMAS Sydney, which was sunk off the West Australian coast following a pitched battle with the German raider Kormoran on 19 November, 1941, is at a crucial stage with funding for the search, estimated to cost about $4.5 million, hanging in the balance.

A non-profit organisation, the Finding Sydney Foundation, together with its trustee company, HMAS Sydney Search Pty Ltd, was established to solve Australia’s most enduring maritime tragedy, has only raised $2.2 million, just under half the funds it needs to get the search underway and is calling on corporate and private support to finally get the project operational.

Leading the campaign is long-time oil industry identity Ted Graham, who has been involved with the search for HMAS Sydney since the late 1980s. Graham, who is currently the Finding Sydney Foundation Chairman, told PESA News most of the money so far raised has come from government departments and agencies but there are time constraints on how long the funding is available.

“I’ve got no personal involvement with HMAS Sydney or the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) but I’m interested in maritime history,” Graham said. “A lot of the close relatives of the 645 missing Australians from the Sydney are very elderly now and they deserve closure during their lifetime to at least know where their loved ones lie.”

“My feeling is that the search needs to be done now while those near relatives are still with us,” he said. “If my generation doesn’t do it, I’m not sure when it will be done. We’ve received considerable amounts of money from the government, we’ve got the federal government’s blessing and the RAN’s blessing to go ahead and do it, we just need to raise some more corporate and private money and get it done.”

The federal government has pledged $1.3 million and the Western Australian and New South Wales governments have provided $500,000 and $250,000, respectively. There are also grant applications with the Queensland and Victorian governments and promised donations arriving from corporate supporters.

The foundation has also recently embarked on a new fundraising initiative, called the 645 Campaign, aimed at encouraging individuals and small to medium enterprises to donate $2,000 to the foundation. It believes this amount is achievable by a large number of individuals and small companies. The donations are tax deductible. “We want to raise the remainder by roughly June or July 2007 and are aiming to be in the water in the best weather window between November 2007 and May 2008”, Graham said.

The search for the Sydney has been hampered over the years by the controversy surrounding its loss, and conflicting theories about where the ship, and the German vessel Kormoran, actually lie, and how 645 men could just disappear, with the possible exception of the unknown sailor recently found in a grave at Christmas Island.

Government funding has only become available in recent years after independent researchers from the University of Western Australia and Blue Water Recoveries, UK, came to a consensus that the search area lay off the Shark Bay coast. There were theories that the location was further south, but these were discounted, in part due to surveys carried out during a seismic survey acquisition programme led by Voyager Energy, in a joint venture with Roc Oil, Agip, Apache Norwest Energy and Bounty Oil to the north and west of the Abrolhos Islands in early 2003, and following extensive search efforts undertaken by government agencies.

The high cost of the operation is due to the wide search area, over some 1,450 nm2, covering two possible locations and the mobilisation of equipment not generally available in the region. Graham said the foundation had acquired the services of global shipwreck hunter David Mearns to conduct the search. Among Mearns’s 45 finds have been the rediscovery of German battleship Bismarck and the discovery of HMS Hood.

It has also approached several companies to tender for the two-phase operation using deep towed low and high frequency side scan sonars and a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) or manned submersible vehicle. Water depths could be as deep as 5,000 m.

“These companies have expressed a serious interest in tendering for the work”, Graham said. “One of them is likely to have equipment in the region at the end of 2007.” But Graham acknowledged the search for the Sydney will be difficult and believed there was about an 80 – 85% chance of finding the warship. “The chances are we’ll find Kormoran first because there is a lot of evidence of where it lays, and then we can work out from the Kormoran to locate Sydney.”

Graham said the side scan sonar technology will be used to find signs of wreckage on the sea bed. Wide swathes of about 6 km, using low frequency sonar, will be employed initially, and upon the detection of raw traces, a more focused, high frequency sweep, covering about 1 km, will be used to pinpoint the traces before the ROV or manned submersible is deployed to take video and photographic footage “It’s leading edge technology, we will be working in very deep water and the costs are high. However, we believe the chances are pretty good but we need money to close this out”, Graham said.

Also on the board of directors of a proprietary company HMA3S, established in 2001 as a trustee for the Finding Sydney Foundation, is another oil industry identity, Bob King, who had a long career with Woodside before he started consulting in the industry in 1995, generally on front end project initiation work.

King said he became involved with the search effort after hearing a presentation about the Sydney search from then Voyager Energy Managing Director John Begg at the Petroleum Club in August 2004. “Initially, I provided advice on cost estimates and budgeting for the search as an associate and became a member of the technical search committee with Ted Graham and David Mearns”, King said. He became a director of HMA3S last year and was appointed its general manager in April this year.

King said the foundation would also welcome in-kind donations for services, fuel, travel, accommodation, catering and the use of vessels of opportunity at reduced rates. He said there had been several occasions when suitable vessels could have been made available this year and last year, but the foundation did not have enough funds to proceed with the search. “Our critical date is really the end of May next year and we are aiming to have 80 – 85% of all of our funds raised by then”, he said.

Another foundation director, retired naval Commodore, Bob Trotter, said the bulk of the grant funding, provided by the federal government, was a result of researchers finally reaching a broad consensus on the search area and the support of four Senators, then Defence Minister Robert Hill, Ian Campbell, David Johnson and Chris Ellison, backing the project which was then supported in Cabinet.

Trotter said the funding was provided on the expectation that the private and corporate sector would match the government contribution. But that has not yet happened in a significant way. “We thought that if we could show there were a number of governments that were supporting us it would encourage major industries and businesses to also support us”, Trotter said.

He said a lot of the corporate decision making was done in global head offices overseas and even though local representatives had been keen to support the project, in a lot of cases approval hadn’t been forthcoming from head office. Trotter said even if high profile business people were reluctant to contribute personally, the foundation would welcome their support to provide access to local decision makers. “That’s where we need help, at the top level, so they will at least take our calls”, he said.

He said the foundation tried to avoid all the theories surrounding the loss of the Sydney and its main focus was simply finding the ship. If that occurs, memorials will be established, if possible, at the Sydney and Kormoran sites and a virtual memorial established on the internet. The federal government will have custody of the wrecks when found.

The foundation believes that if not enough money is raised by mid 2007 to contract the required services and if the search is not conducted during late next year or early 2008, then the final resting place of the HMAS Sydney may never be found. “The momentum of fund raising has increased with large donations from governments, but should a search not be mounted in this timeframe, the major objective to bring closure to the close relatives of the Sydney’s ship’s company will be significantly eroded.”

Sydney Search Foundation

Level 3, 267 St Georges Terrace
Perth, Western Australia 6000
Phone: 9261 7749
Email: info@findingsydney.com
Web: www.findingsydney.com

Donations may be made by cheque to:

Finding Sydney Foundation
PO Box 7798, Cloisters Square, WA, 6850

or online at:
www.findingsydney.com.au/donate.asp

HMAS Sydney was the pride of the Royal Australian Navy fleet. The 6,830 t modified Leander class cruiser was the pride of the Royal Australian Navy fleet. It had an illustrious battle record following earlier successful engagements in the Mediterranean war theatre and carrying out ship escort duties between Australia and South East Asia. Photo courtesy of Navy History Unit.