HMAS Arrow (P 88) was an Attack
class patrol boat of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). She was built
by Walkers Limited at Maryborough, Queensland, launched on 17
February 1968, and commissioned on 3 July 1968.
This image shows several Attack class patrol boats berthed beside
Stokes Hill Wharf. This was prior to the construction of a Patrol
Boat base being built.
HMAS Arrow was based in Darwin and suffered severely when Cyclone
Tracy struck in December 1974.
In the harbour the patrol boats HMAS ARROW, and HMAS ATTACK,
attempted to sail and ride out the storm at sea. Neither vessel
made it out of the harbour. ATTACK was blown ashore and
damaged.
This were a lot worse for the ARROW, it was driven under Stokes
Hill Wharf, and sank with the loss of two of her crew, (PO Leslie
Catton and AB Ian Rennie).
In 1977 AB R. A. McLeod, RAN, was awarded the Australian Bravery
Medal for the rescue of five members of the crew of HMAS ARROW,
(patrol boat), which sank in Darwin Harbour during Cyclone Tracy,
on Christmas morning, 1974. AB McLeod was injured himself at the
time of the rescues.
The ARROW was salvaged and stripped of anything of value and left
on the mud flats near where the cache is.
In the earlier 80’s when the Fisherman’s Wharf and ship facility
was constructed on reclaimed land the ARROW was left where it lay
and is now underneath the area between the cache and the
water.