A relative of one of the crew members on HMAS Yarra II, has been left angered after finding graffiti sprayed across its memorial in Newport.
Melissa Birch noticed the graffiti when she visited the memorial on Wednesday 21 January.
“The first thing I noticed when I pulled up was that one of the young gum trees had been kicked over at the entrance and then when I reached the memorial there was all this yellow spray paint on the ground,” Ms Birch, a member of the memorial’s family and friends group, said.
“They’d left the plaques alone, thankfully, but the ship’s crest, which is on the ground and is a mosaic of a Kookaburra, had a yellow trident put through it and then one going the other way, so criss-crossing tridents,” she said, adding that more yellow tridents were found sprayed on the memorial jetty beside the Yarra River.
Photos seen by Star Weekly show no words or symbols to indicating any meaning behind the graffiti.
Ms Birch, whose great uncle was aboard HMAS Yarra II when it was sunk by the Japanese off the coast of Java in 1942, was stunned that anyone would attack the site.
“It’s a war memorial to 138 men who died and someone goes and desecrates it,” she said incredulously.
Ms Birch said she reported the graffiti to Hobsons Bay council and that council had already received a complaint on 19 January, meaning the graffiti was at least two days old when she found it.
A council spokesperson has confirmed that the graffiti has now been removed.
