Tahiti rail plantations. Its diet appears to have consisted mainly of insects and occasionally copra (coconut meat). The extinction of the Tahiti rail was probably due to predation by humans and introduced cats and rats. It appears to have become extinct some time after 1844 on Tahiti, and perhaps as late as the 1930s on Mehetia. The Tahiti rail was found on the South Pacific island of Tahiti (part of the Society Islands archipelago) by naturalists who were part of the British explorer James Cook's second voyage around the world (1772–1775). The bird was illustrated by Georg Forster, who accompanied his father,
SS Empire Explorer general cargo, sugar and 38 bags of mail. She left the convoy at the Clyde, arriving on 15 May. "Empire Explorer" sailed on 1 June to join Convoy OS 30, which departed from Liverpool that day and arrived at Freetown, Sierra Leone on 19 June. She was in ballast and armed with a 4-inch or 4.7-inch gun, eight machine guns and a number of kites. She was stated to be bound for George, South Africa. She arrived at Demerara on 21 June, sailing nine days later for Trinidad, where she arrived on 1 July. "Empire Explorer" sailed from Trinidad on