Rocket Shed - Portland Victoria
Posted by: 
bucketeer
S 38° 21.070 E 141° 36.436
54H E 553061 N 5755046
Built in 1886 from local bluestone to house rockets, what else.
Waymark Code: WMA078
Location: Victoria, Australia
Date Posted: 10/25/2010
Views: 8
The new display in the rocket shed was officially opened in April 2010.
The display includes a rocket, rocket launcher and rocket line box, megaphone, tally boards, stores box, water barrico, fuse box, rocket carrier powder box located behind a glass wall the rocket shed and is open from 10am - 12pm and 1pm - 4pm every day, with free entry. well worth a stop and view of what 19th century shipweck rescues might have been like.
Rocket rescue equipment was stored in the shed, and used by volunteer rocket crews who attended ship rescues in the region.
In Portland, the lifeboat crew and the rocket crew were generally the same group of volunteers, many being fisherman or whalers. The rocket rescue service supplemented the limited range that lifeboats could provide during a sea rescue.
The rocket line of one inch Italian hemp was the first of a series of successfully stronger lines sent from the shore to the wreck, fired from the rocket launcher.
As the survivors pulled it in, an attached tally board gave instructions in four languages of the procedure. To their end of the heavier rocket line, the rescue crew attached a heavier endless line called a whip with a tail block attached. Secured to the mast, the whip carried out a hawser to which a breeches buoy was attached. One by one, the rescued were brought to shore in the breeches buoy.
Rocket equipment was used by the Portland crew on four occasions: at the wreck of the “Admella” (
visit link) in 1859; “Tamora” in 1860; “Jane” in 1863; and “Lady Robilliard” in 1867. Only at the wreck of the Tamora and Lady Robilliard was the rocket line used successfully.
Information was taken from the Glenelg Shire's website (
visit link)