(the latter carrying Detmers and towing several small floats), one workboat carrying 72 people, one boat with 31 men aboard, and two rafts, each bearing 26 sailors. During the evacuation, a rubber life raft carrying 60 people, mostly wounded, sank without warning, drowning all but three aboard.Winter, H.M.A.S. Sydney, p. 142 Total German casualties were six officers, 75 sailors, and one Chinese laundryman. Search and rescueNote: All times in this section are UTC+8.When Sydney did not arrive on schedule, there was no immediate concern; the northbound journey with Zealandia could have taken longer than expected, Durban could have been late to the rendezvous, Sydney could have diverted to aid southbound merchant shipping, or minor engine problems could have occurred.Olson, Bitter Victory, p. 34 Warships were expected to maintain wireless silence unless absolutely necessary; none of these was sufficient reason to break silence and inform Fremantle of the delay. When the ship failed to arrive by 23 November, wireless communications stations (initially those in Fremantle, then all high-power stations in Australia) began signalling, ordering Sydney to report in. At 06:00 on 23 November, the troopship recovered one of the two rafts carrying 26 German sailors at . Initially believing that these were survivors of a German raider attack and that the raider might still be in the area, Aquitania resumed her voyage to Sydney, maintaining silence until the afternoon of 26 November. Detmers saw the troopship but did not make their boat's presence known, as he hoped to be recovered by a neutral ship. Six Lockheed Hudson aircraft from No. 14 Squadron RAAF, based at RAAF Base Pearce, began to search for the ship on the morning of 24 November. When it was learned that the Zealandia handover occurred on schedule, air searches commenced in the Java Sea. The first news relating to the engagement between Sydney and Kormoran was received by the Australian Naval Board during the afternoon of 24 November; the British tanker Trocas reported that she had rescued a raft at 15:00 carrying 25 German naval personnel (one having perished) at .Gill, The Royal Australian Navy, 1939–1942, p. 452 After further communication with Trocas, the Naval Board learned that the sailors had come from the raider Kormoran, which had participated in a mutually destructive engagement with an unspecified ship, which the Naval Board assumed was Sydney. Wireless signals to Sydney ceased, as it was assumed that if the