SS Waratah as pictured on the film pitch pack. The ship was lost in 1909 off the east coast of South Africa with 211 people on board. No trace of her was ever found.
SS Waratah as pictured on the film pitch pack. The ship was lost in 1909 off the east coast of South Africa with 211 people on board. No trace of her was ever found.
Levin is home to a brand-new film production studio called Blue Line Productions.
“The appeal and reputation of New Zealand as a base for world-class film production is a given,” said Levin resident and Blue Line Productions director Guy Dobson, who has a personal connection to the leading figure in the film: the owner of the vanished British passenger ship SS Waratah.
“The industry resourcefulness continues to surprise its followers, none more so than the establishment of yet another media creative enterprise in the country,” he said.
“Levin’s close proximity to the film capital, Wellington, is ideal with its Weta studios and other leading production capabilities for easy, stress-free access, even more so since the opening of the Peka Peka to North of Ōtaki Expressway — a trip of now just over the hour.”
Guy Dobson is the step-great-grandson of the owner of the SS Waratah.
The company is working on what it says is an Edwardian Poseidon adventure, Waratah in a Perfect Storm, about the fate of a ship called SS Waratah, lost off the east coast of South Africa in 1909.
The ship’s owner was a British businessman, originally from Denmark, who had worked hard to become a shipping tycoon. “Widely respected, tough and not entirely ruthless, William or Wilhelm Lund set up the Blue Anchor Line, building it up to an 11-ship business based in London.
“However, when his then-state-of-the-art ship SS Waratah was lost in the Indian Ocean in 1909 with all hands, his empire quickly ended in disaster.
“He was a leading sail and running rigging technician and the loss of a job through an employer’s business failure led him and a few mates to scrape together enough money to buy a stake in a small wooden barque.
Inspired by earlier sea voyages to the Far East, he wanted to provide passengers with comfortable accommodation in safe, fast, reliable ships.
“Inspired by earlier sea voyages to the Far East, he wanted to provide passengers with comfortable accommodation in safe, fast, reliable ships that were able to overcome all weather, especially such as you find the Southern Ocean.
“The line grew quickly, taking routes to Cape Town, East London, Durban, Fremantle, Melbourne, Sydney, and Shanghai, though not all went well. One ship ran on rocks while another, trying to rescue a ship, ended up drifting around for weeks without propulsion while on its way from Australia to the coronation of King George V. Apparently, much to the delight of its mostly Australian passengers,” Dobson said.
Lund married twice, was deeply affected by the loss of his first wife, and had two sons by his second wife, both of whom became his business partners.
“He was forever haunted and visited by demons because of the loss of the Waratah,” said Dobson, who is Lund’s step-great-grandson.
William Lund image circa 1908, when he was at the peak of his fortune, and a year before the Waratah disaster.
Lund died at the age of 94 in Chislehurst, Kent, England. While the SS Waratah was lost with 211 people on board, no trace of it was ever found.
On its journey out of Durban it was spotted by several other ships and was last seen at 9.30am on July 27, 1909. The weather is known to have worsened during the day and developed into a hurricane by July 28. It was expected in Cape Town on July 29, but never arrived.
Unconfirmed sightings were eventually reported, such as one by a soldier, who not until 1929 said he watched the ship roll and go under. Many theories were offered as to what might have happened or what might have caused the loss of the ship, but no one knows and so far not even a bit of a wreck has been found that could be identified as being from the SS Waratah.
SS Waratah soon after her launch in 1908.
In the 1990s, there was brief hope of a find, but a wreck found turned out to be from a different ship.
Several churches in the UK have plaques commemoratingforever locals who disappeared with the ship.
He was for ever haunted and visited by demons because of the loss of the Waratah.
Dobson has found renowned adventurer/explorer Emlyn Brown from Cape Town as a business partner in the film production about the lost ship, a disaster he describes as having been as bad as that of the Titanic, but with no sign ever found of the ship.
Emlyn Brown has been searching for the SS Waratah for decades, without success.
Brown had been searching for the Waratah for 40 years, in 14 expeditions, and has worked in film and television productions. He has worked closely with author and explorer Dr Clive Cussler. The ship is clearly not where he thought it would be and he is at a loss as to where to look next. It could have drifted anywhere in the wild weather and the Indian Ocean is known to be very deep.
Gavriel Nissim Bar-O from Wyoming in the US is an author, illustrator, and modelmaker with a lifelong interest in the Waratah who has compiled a history of the ship and will also be involved in the movie’s production.
Dobson and Brown have collaborated over the past years on the screenplay, which was recently completed, and they said they will spend much of 2023 looking for funding. They expect the movie will be shot in many countries and locations.
