The new New Bedford, Martha’s Vineyard & Nantucket Steamboat Company consolidated from the New Bedford, Vineyard & Nantucket and the Nantucket & Cape Cod Steamboat Companies, was organized in New Bedford Thursday, 25th ult.

The new steamer Nantucket is about completed, and will come on the route about the 22nd of the present month. Capt. Charles C. Smith, of the steamer Monohansett, will bring her from the place of building and command her.

The Pusey & Jones Co., of Wilmington, Del., the builders of steamer Nantucket, have contracted to have another steamer ready to go on the line June 1st, 1891, and from the description which has been given she will excel in speed and seagoing qualities any steamboat ever on the line. The dimensions will be as follows: 210 feet long, 34 feet wide, 11 feet 6 inches deep, and draw 4 3/4 feet of water, which will allow her to go over Nantucket bar at any time of tide.

Steamer Nantucket was still fast in the sand of Sturgeon Flats this morning, with the prospect that more powerful towing equipment or the aid of a dredger will be needed to get her clear. Attempts were made to float her at high tide last night, and the working vessels were heard tooting again this morning in the thick fog which surrounded all the craft and made them invisible from the shore.

The ferry Islander of the Massachusetts Steamship Lines will make her shake-down cruise on Sunday and begin regular operation Monday, April 15, with four round trips daily between Woods Hole and Vineyard Haven, according to the schedule released today and announced by the line’s president, Paul E. Thurlow.

The ferry is the former Hackensack, used on the run across the Hudson between New York city and New Jersey. She can carry fifty automobiles and seat 500 passengers in service between Woods Hole and Vineyard Haven. Her scheduled time is one hour form slip to slip.

The new Vineyard ferry Islander arrived at Vineyard Haven yesterday afternoon, greeted with whistles from the Martha’s Vineyard, which lay at the dock, the whistles of the fleet of Taylor’s lighters, and blasts from assembled cars. All down-Island towns had displayed their flags throughout the day, and the visiting hours, together with music by the Vineyard Haven Band, followed during the early evening when more than 3,400 people inspected the boat.

An opinion entirely favorable to the Islands has been given to Governor Furcolo by Attorney General Edward J. McCormack Jr., relative to the Steamship Authority bill. The measure was returned to the Senate once again on Tuesday and is now back on the governor’s desk for another grace period of five days within which he may sign or veto it. But this is only one of a number of bills which have been shuttled in this manner between the Senate and Governor Furcolo.

The Steamship Authority has purchased the 157-foot diesel-powered motor vessel Auriga for use as a freight carrier. The price was $435,140, “which will be augmented by the cost of modifications for Island service, as well as outfitting and delivery costs.”

According to a statement released by the boatline this week, Auriga will be employed primarily in transporting trucks and freight from Woods Hole to Nantucket during the summer schedule.”

As the steamer Nobska slipped past the Chops on the ebbing tide late yesterday afternoon, there was none of the celebration that greeted her arrival in these waters just about 50 years ago.

Her decks were empty, her boilers cold. When she left Nantucket slip yesterday she didn’t sound one long blast on the steam whistle people hereabouts have come to know as hers just by the sound - she was on the end of a Coastline Towing Company hawser.

The SS Naushon collided head-on with the freight boat Auriga in thick fog at 8:55 yesterday morning.

The two Steamship Authority vessels hit one another about one mile east of Nobska lighthouse at Woods Hole. The Coast Guard said that at the time of the collision, seas were calm and the visibility was zero.

Fourteen people were injured, 11 passengers aboard the Naushon and three crew members on the Auriga. All were taken to Falmouth Hospital, but were released later in the day.