[3][4] She was equipped with two 6-cylinder Harland and Wolff diesel engines of the Burmeister & Wain type, built under sublicense by Hong Kong and Whampoa Dock.

These two-stroke cycle single acting engines had a combined power output of 2,400 bhp (1,800 kW) and drove twin screw propellers.

[2][3][4] In the early part of the Second World War, the Tulagi had led a charmed life, surviving an intense Japanese air attack on the 16 February Allied convoy carrying reinforcements and supplies to Kupang (escorted by the heavy cruiser USS Houston, the destroyer USS Peary), and the surprise Japanese attack on Darwin on 19 February 1942.

[5] The Tulagi's luck ran out in March 1944 while undertaking a voyage from Sydney to Colombo in Ceylon, carrying 1800 tons of flour and 380 bags of mail.

On 28 March 1944 at 00:10, the Tulagi was located in the middle of the Indian Ocean, around 300 km south east of the Chagos Islands, when she was hit by two torpedoes fired by the German submarine U-532.

Jacobs (Purser) R.T. Charles (2nd Officer) Ali Bin Sariwee (Malay Quartermaster) Note: Ali was from Jahore, Singapore Amos Helwend (Malay Quartermaster) Note: Amos was from Barbar Island in Indonesia Kalipan (Malay Quartermaster) Note: Kalipan was from Alor Island in Indonesia Basu Mian Abdul Bhooya (Indian greaser).

Rations were supplemented by an occasional fish caught by the Malays using an improvised spear made from a pair of scissors lashed to a raft stanchion.

All three Australian survivors stated that they owed their lives to untiring perseverance and unselfishness of the Malay seamen spearing fish, catching birds and capturing every drop of rain.