MS Achille Lauro
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Achille Lauro
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History | |
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Name |
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Namesake |
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Owner |
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Operator |
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Port of registry | |
Ordered | 7 May 1938 |
Builder | KM 'De Schelde' S&M, Vlissingen |
Yard number | 214 |
Laid down | 25 January 1939[1] |
Launched | 1 July 1946[1] (Delayed due to WWII) |
Christened | by HM Queen Wilhelmina[2] |
Completed | 21 November 1947[1] |
Maiden voyage | 2 December 1947[1] |
Out of service | 30 November 1994 |
Identification |
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Fate | Sank on 2 December 1994 off the coast of Somalia due to fire on board. |
General characteristics | |
Tonnage |
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Length | 642 ft (196 m)[2] |
Beam | 82 ft (25 m)[2] |
Draft | 29.3 ft (8.9 m)[2] |
Decks | 9 [2] (6 passenger accessible)[1] |
Installed power |
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Propulsion | 2 propellers[1] |
Speed | 22.0 kn (40.7 km/h; 25.3 mph)[1] |
Capacity | |
Crew | 300 [2] |
MS Achille Lauro was a
The ship was also involved in two serious collisions: in 1953 with the Oranje, and in 1975 with the cargo ship Youseff. It also suffered four onboard fires or explosions: in 1965, 1972, 1981, and 1994. In the last of these, in 1994, the ship caught fire and sank in the Indian Ocean off Somalia.
Concept and construction
Ordered in 1938 to replace the aging ships on the Dutch East Indies route, she was laid down in 1939 at Koninklijke Maatschappij 'De Schelde'. Scheepswerf en Machinefabriek in Vlissingen, Netherlands, for Rotterdamsche Lloyd (now part of Nedlloyd). Interrupted by World War II and two bombing raids, the ship was finally launched in July 1946, as Willem Ruys. The ship was named after the grandson of the founder of Rotterdamsche Lloyd, whom the Germans had taken hostage and shot during the war.
Willem Ruys was completed in late 1947. At that time, the Rotterdamsche Lloyd had been granted a royal prefix in honour of its services during the war. Willem Ruys was 192 metres (630 ft) in length, 25 metres (82 ft) in beam, had a draught of 8.9 metres (29.2 ft), and measured 21,119 gross register tons. Eight Sulzer engines drove two propellers. She could accommodate 900 passengers. She featured a superstructure very different from other liners of that era; Willem Ruys pioneered low-slung aluminium lifeboats, within the upper-works' flanks. The next ship to adopt this arrangement was the Canberra in 1961. Today, all cruise ships follow this layout, with fibreglass-reinforced plastic (FRP) used for lifeboat hulls.
Service history
As the Willem Ruys
On the East Indies route
As Willem Ruys, the ship began her maiden voyage on 5 December 1947. Together with her main competitor and running mate, the MS Oranje of the Netherland Line, she became a popular fixture on the Dutch East Indies route. However, when the East Indies gained independence from The Netherlands in 1949, passenger numbers decreased.
The future
Collision with Oranje
On 6 January 1953, Willem Ruys collided in the Red Sea with running mate Oranje, which was heading in the opposite direction. At that time, it was common for passenger ships to pass each other at close range to entertain their passengers. During the (later heavily criticized) abrupt and fast approach of Oranje, Willem Ruys made an unexpected swing to the left, resulting in a collision. Oranje badly damaged her bow. Due to the possibility that she would be impounded for safety reasons, she was unable to call at Colombo as scheduled, and went directly to Jakarta. Willem Ruys suffered less damage. There was no loss of life involved. Later, it was determined that miscommunication on both ships had caused the collision.
Journey to Java
During 1957, the English diplomat, author and diarist Harold Nicolson and his wife, the author and poet Vita Sackville-West, toured the Far East for two months aboard Willem Ruys. The voyage is documented in Journey to Java, his published journal of the trip,[4] which provides a detailed account of first class travel on the vessel in the 1950s.
Later years
After repairs, Royal Rotterdam Lloyd decided to release Willem Ruys on the North Atlantic run. First, she was placed on the New York service, and later Canada was included.
In 1958, the Royal Rotterdamsche Lloyd and the
On 7 March 1959, Willem Ruys went off on her new world service to Australia and New Zealand. She departed from Rotterdam, sailing via Southampton, the Mediterranean, the Suez Canal, Fremantle, Melbourne, Sydney, New Zealand, returning via the Panama Canal. The Royal Dutch Mail Ships (Willem Ruys, Johan van Oldenbarnevelt and Oranje) became a popular alternative to the British liners.
At the end of 1964, due to a strong drop in passenger numbers, Willem Ruys was laid up in Rotterdam and put up for sale.
As Achille Lauro
In 1965, she was sold to the
Achille Lauro was converted to a cruise ship in early 1972, during which time she suffered a disastrous fire. A 1975 collision with the cargo ship Youseff resulted in the sinking of the latter, and another onboard fire in 1981 took her out of service for a time. She was laid up in Tenerife when Lauro Lines went bankrupt in 1982. The Chandris Line took possession of her under a charter arrangement in 1985, shortly before the hijacking.
The ship was chartered by a private group for the duration of the 1987 America’s Cup series held in Fremantle, Western Australia, to act as a viewing platform and accommodation for 1,400 visitors. It also housed the international jury which oversaw the races.
1985 hijacking
On 7 October 1985, four members of the
The ship then headed back towards Port Said, and after two days of negotiations, the hijackers agreed to abandon the liner in exchange for safe conduct and were flown towards Tunisia aboard an Egyptian commercial airliner. This airliner, however, was intercepted by U.S. Navy F-14 Tomcat fighter aircraft and directed to land in Sicily. There, the United States Delta Force unsuccessfully attempted to extract the hijackers in order to try them in the United States, thereby causing the Sigonella Crisis. The four terrorists were ultimately sentenced to prison terms by the Italian courts, while the operation's mastermind, who had not taken part in the actual hijacking, was given passage to Yugoslavia and escaped.[6]
Later years, fire, and sinking
The ship continued in service. She was re-flagged in 1989 when the Lauro Line was taken over by the Mediterranean Shipping Company to become "StarLauro".
In the evening of 30 November 1994 she caught fire off the coast of Somalia while en route to South Africa, with 979 passengers and crew aboard. At that time, Italian officials said the fire had been caused by a discarded cigarette. Later analysis suggests that the fire started in the engine room after one of the crankcases exploded which allowed cooling oil to get into the exhaust. Because of a lack of supervision, the fire burned out of control before its discovery.[7] The crew battled the fire unsuccessfully for several hours, first with hoses and then by passing buckets from the swimming pool. Entertainer Moss Hills, who led rescue efforts during the sinking of MTS Oceanos in 1991, recalled that pouring water on an oil fire was ineffective, while making the conflagration worse.[8] The vessel was abandoned in the morning after developing a list. A small number of crew and passengers were unable to board the main lifeboats due to flames coming up from the hull, so they climbed down a rope ladder from the stern to reach inflatable boats. Two died and eight were injured during the evacuation and transfer to rescue ships. Among the ships that responded to the call were USS Gettysburg and USS Halyburton.[9] Achille Lauro sank on 2 December 1994, which was witnessed by a fire tugboat that had arrived to assess salvageability. The wreck has not been located since.[10]
See also
- Lauro Lines v. Chasser, a U.S. Supreme Court case dealing with the Achille Lauro hijacking
- The Hijacking of the Achille Lauro, 1989 film
- Voyage of Terror: The Achille Lauro Affair, 1990 film
- The Death of Klinghoffer, 1991 opera
- List of hostage crises
- 1979 Nahariya attack
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k "Name ship: Willem Ruys". Stichting Maritiem-Historische Databank. Retrieved March 12, 2016.
- ^ ISBN 978-2-8315-1327-0.
- ^ "The Singapore Story". Time. 3 March 2011.
- ^ Nicolson, Harold (1957). Journey to Java. London: Constable.
- ^ Berman, Daphna (9 May 2008). "Klinghoffer daughters recall personal tragedy at commemoration of terror victims outside Israel". Haaretz.
- ^ Shenon, Philip (October 14, 1985). "U.S. Reported to have evidence linking PLO Aide to Hijacking". The New York Times.
- ^ Cowell, Alan (2 December 1994). "Achille Lauro Smolders After 1,000 are Rescued". The New York Times. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ "The Story of the Achille Lauro ". YouTube.
- ^ "BBC on This Day 30 November 1994: Blazing liner abandoned off east Africa". BBC News. 2008. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ Reuben Goossens. "Achille Lauro". ssMaritime.com. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
Further reading
- Bohn, Michael K. (2004). The Achille Lauro Hijacking: Lessons in the Politics and Prejudice of Terrorism. Potomac Books, Inc. ISBN 978-1-574-88779-2.