Episode Details

The Unexplained Disappearance of the Patanela | Australian Mystery

In November of 1988, a steel-hulled schooner called the Patanela made three radio calls from ten miles off Botany Bay and disappeared.

No wreckage. No bodies. No distress signal. No explanation that holds together under examination.

Just an experienced skipper asking for directions to a town he'd already passed, a silence where a voice used to be, and one barnacled lifebuoy that turned up six months later and raised more questions than it answered.

Four people were aboard.

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Theme Music - Jesse Frank on Pixabay

Sources:

• Janice Jarrett, "Operation 'Lilac' The mystery of the Patanela", Platypus: The Journal of the Australian Federal Police, Issue 36/38, July 1992. 
• NSW Coronial Inquest, Deputy State Coroner Derrick Hand, Glebe Coroner's Court, 1992. 
• Sydney Morning Herald, 9 February 2008. "Message in a bottle redeems lost sons."
• Paul Whittaker and Robert Reid, Patanela Is Missing: Australia's Greatest Sea Mystery, Bantam Books, Sydney, 1993.
• Philip Temple, The Sea and the Snow, 1966 (reissued).
• Derrick Hand, The Coroner, ABC Books, 2004.
• John Pinkney, Great Australian Mysteries, Five Mile Press, 2004.
• Under Investigation with Liz Hayes, "Ghost Ship: What happened to the Patanela?", Channel Nine, 1 March 2023.