雅思阅读材料：避难者船只撞毁在澳大利亚海岸_雅思英语阅读

雅思阅读材料：避难者船只撞毁在澳大利亚海岸

　　Photos and videos taken by witnesses at the scene show the wooden boat crashing into the rocks and breaking apart. The images also show people floating in the water amid the wreckage. The boat was about 20ft to 30ft long, with a cabin covered by a sheet of fabric or plastic.

　　Simon Prince, who lives next to the cliff where the boat crashed, said he was woken by what he thought were cheers. He walked outside to the cliff and instead heard cries for help from a boat just offshore.

　　The engine had failed. They were washing backward and forward very close to the cliffs here, which are jagged limestone cliffs, very nasty.

　　He called the police and soon there were dozens of locals standing on the cliffs, wondering how they could help despite the storm and crashing waves.

　　He said the boat, carrying about 50 people, was tossed about for an hour before it finally hit the rocks at the base of the cliff.

　　When the boat hit the cliff there was a sickening crack. All the people on board rushed to the land side, which is the worst thing they could do, but I dont think anybody could swim. I think there were about two lifeboats on board this thing, Mr Prince said.

　　It was just horrible. People getting crushed. Bodies, dead children, the whole thing was pretty awful.

　　Mr Prince, who owns a dive shop, and other neighbours began hurling lifejackets into the water, 50 or 60 of them. But many just floated away. Some would-be rescuers were injured on the rocks while trying to get the lifejackets to those in the water, and needed stitches later, he said.