"Like a great flaming wall approaching the ship from the

                                    land at a terrific rate, carrying with it a huge tidal wave, ..."

 

       In those few seconds Edward saw the Roraima, anchored just ahead of them, dismasted and laid over on her side and set alight from the enormous violence and realised the fireball was racing towards the Roddam. 
       With the noise of the explosion still ringing in his ears, while trying to gather his thoughts, he felt the first rush of scorching, suffocating blast, and shouted down to Plissonneau, who was still in his launch, to come aboard. 
Later reports said an undersea landslip off Martinique, previously at a depth 600 feet, plunged to 4000 feet occurred at the same time. This had the effect of increasing the size of the tidal wave. The sea withdrew several hundred feet and, as Mr Pyle recalled, ‘. . . the first outburst took place and the vessel was thrown on her beam ends.’ 
       As Plissonneau felt his launch start to drop from beneath him he just had time to reach for a handhold on the companionway and, unhurt, managed to pull himself up onto the Roddam’s deck as the sea receded several hundred feet. 
       Mr Schleswick, one of the engineers, was ‘sitting on deck with the chief engineer Mr Watters, watching the thick cloud of smoke coming out of the volcano when it burst out with a flame and a cloud of hot dust came rushing over the town towards the ship, setting the houses in the town on fire at once and striking the ship so hard on her port-side that she listed over and took water in through her ports.’ 
       Watters immediately took in the situation and leapt to his feet and started forward to round up his men knowing they would be urgently needed in the engine room but he had only taken a few steps when he was struck by a ball of flaming, molten lava which burnt off half his face and knocked him unconscious. 
       At the same time Edward’s first officer and friend, Mr Laws, with no thought for his own safety ordered the engineers to the engine room and the deck crew to close the engine room skylights. 
       Then it came - sweeping, leaping on down upon the rest of the shipping in the harbour in what appeared to be a huge black squall. Like a great flaming wall approaching the ship from the land at a terrific rate, carrying with it a huge tidal wave, and accompanied by a loud, rumbling noise it rushed straight for the Roddam.