["Six Days Out", The West Australian, Wednesday 27 March 1912, page 7]
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The belief expressed that the Koombana put back to Port Hedland rather than face the storm found no support among mariners, who hold that the only hope for her safety lay in making a run for it out to sea...
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The various theories which have been advanced and to which reference has been made in these columns are canvassed and re-canvassed by those having more or less expert knowledge of the North-West coast. The idea of the Koombana returning to Port Hedland when the cyclone was observed to be bearing down on the vessel is scouted by most people, who hold that it would be a suicidal policy for Captain Allen to have attempted to seek safety in the Hedland anchorage. On this point, Capt. Ulrich one of the pilots at Fremantle, who knows the North-West coast thoroughly, remarked yesterday that it would be simply courting certain disaster for the Koombana to have returned to Hedland. "If she went in there," he remarked, "she would be up among the mangroves in less than no time. Capt. Allen would make a run for it out to sea. It is a nasty place to be caught in, and if Capt. Allen got into some of the corners, so to speak, he would simply be caught in a trap. He may have seen the weather coming and steamed out to the westward, which, If he managed to keep going with the storm coming from the direction it did, might enable him to get to the open sea where he would have a better chance of braving the storm. He made out towards the west, and that was the last seen of him. What became of him then is what we would all like to know."
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