Shipwreck island gives up its secrets

STAND looking out to sea at Porthcawl or Ogmore and you may catch glimpse of a rocky island about three kilometres out to sea.

That small mass of land, with waves lapping at its jagged and uneven shore, is Tusker Rock.

Despite measuring less than 500 metres across, over the centuries the island has claimed a number of ships in the Bristol Channel.

You can still see their twisted metal corpses littering the rock. Some have been there for centuries, their rusted hulls now almost part of the island.

The name Tusker has no Welsh link – it is, in fact, Viking. It takes its name from Tuska, a Danish Viking who lived in (and terrorised) the Vale of Glamorgan.

It is perhaps fitting that the island, which is such a scourge of ships along the coast, should be named after a people synonymous with danger coming from the sea.

One of the vessels which became a victim of Tusker was called the Malleny, a Portuguese iron ship bound for Rio with a cargo of Welsh coal.

She was tragically lost along with her 20 crew on October 14, 1886, when she collided with the rock.

Due to poor weather, the captain decided to shelter in Swansea Bay. However, as she sailed in heavy seas across the bay, her rudder was lost and she drifted towards the coast.

Although she was sighted in the bay, the high winds had taken down the telegraph lines and it was impossible to alert the Porthcawl Lifeboat.

It is said that the bodies of the seamen were washed up on the shore at Southerndown, Marcross and St Donats.

One member of the crew did escape. Edwin Waters was the ship’s carpenter but he had disembarked in Amsterdam, unbeknown to his family. When he arrived home he found all his relatives wearing black and mourning him.

The name plate of the Malleny was washed up at Westward Ho! in Devon.

You cannot see the ship on the island now. It was there until 1979, when it was blown up by the military.

Four years before the Malleny disaster, on March 29, 1882, the French steamer Liban also sank, but fortunately eight of the crew were saved by the Porthcawl Lifeboat. Despite their efforts, three of the crew did die in the waves.

Despite its deadly history, the rock has often been thwarted by locals.

In November 1847, the three-mast ship Henry of Liverpool was bound for Cardiff when it hit the rock.

The vessel was breaking up when two people, known as William and Jane from Barnstaple, spotted them. They raised the alarm and were able to save 18 of her crew, though an apprentice was lost.

The rock is at its most perilous when there is poor visibility. In December 1870, there was very thick fog when the Cardiff ship Dasher started to break up after hitting the rock. Reports suggest that because of the weather the wreck was not sighted.

Luckily the pilot and his two assistants used the wreckage to build a raft which kept them alive until they were picked up by the Porthcawl lifeboat Good Deliverance.