Transatlantic Pipe Break Incident (21-22 May 2002 engine room flooding)

[Rod]

I am not positive about this......but I do not think lifeboats are required for sailing. With no passengers. Life rafts would probably do, depending on the amount of crew. You would need one on each side with a radio, but a portable radio might do.

[Andy Holloway]

I am not positive about this......but I do not think lifeboats are required for sailing. With no passengers. Life rafts would probably do, depending on the amount of crew. You would need one on each side with a radio, but a portable radio might do.

I suspect that it'll depend on what the 'port state' [country of registration] have to say and, being Vanuatu anything could be possible!!

[Trevor Harris]

I am not positive about this......but I do not think lifeboats are required for sailing. With no passengers. Life rafts would probably do, depending on the amount of crew. You would need one on each side with a radio, but a portable radio might do.

Oh! I had no clue. Did American star have lifeboats when being towed or no?

[Thomas Hypher]

Oh! I had no clue. Did American star have lifeboats when being towed or no?

American Star (SS United States' running mate but not sister ship as often stated when SS America - since she was much older and smaller and slower) had all her davits and lifeboats/tenders removed some time before her final voyage since (if I recall correctly, and correct me if I'm wrong!) she was sold for scrap before being bought to become a static hotel.

[June Ingram]

Poor SS America never made it to be an hotel nor to the breakers -

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwj1po6WzsrVAhUowYMKHVmUDfMQjRwIBw&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.urbanghostsmedia.com%2F2014%2F06%2Fwreck-ss-american-star-photos%2F&psig=AFQjCNEjxdwOHTQgZh7oOvpp7z-KZR_nLg&ust=1502383864630648

[Thomas Hypher]

SS American Star was one of the first shipwrecks I learnt about due to a 1999 year issue (can't remember the month) of Sea Lines (the magazine of the Ocean Liner Society) I remember reading around 1999. Coincidentally this issue or another from 1999 also reported the sinking of the SS Sun Vista (the old Italian ocean liner SS Galileo Galilei) due to an engine room switchboard fire, somewhere in the Straits of Malacca. I'll have to dig this issue out and photo the front cover (with copyright permission of course!) when I'm next home since it shows the wreck SS American Star around 1999 (she was wrecked in 1994).

Thomas

[Boris]

... reported the sinking of the SS Sun Vista (the old Italian ocean liner SS Galileo Galilei) due to an engine room switchboard fire ... Thomas

The Merch is a small world.

I caught up with an ex-shipmate of mine about 2 months ago in UK: an ex-QE2 F&B Officer from the early 70's. He left Cunard in 1977 to take both the Galileo and the Raffaello from La Spezia to Bushehr. to serve as floating barracks for the Imperial Iranian Navy. He then managed these up until the fall of the Shah. The stories he can tell of his overland escape from Iran at that time would make your hair curl.

[Thomas Hypher]

The Merch is a small world.

I caught up with an ex-shipmate of mine about 2 months ago in UK: an ex-QE2 F&B Officer from the early 70's. He left Cunard in 1977 to take both the Galileo and the Raffaello from La Spezia to Bushehr. to serve as floating barracks for the Imperial Iranian Navy. He then managed these up until the fall of the Shah. The stories he can tell of his overland escape from Iran at that time would make your hair curl.

Sorry to be pedantic and correct you here, but the Galileo and Raffaello were not sister ships. Michelangelo and Raffaello were sister ships and were sold together to the Shah. Galileo Galilei and Guglielmo Marconi were sister ships who went on to have very different lives as cruise ships with very different cruise lines. However, both pairs of ships were completed at around the same time and were withdrawn from their original liner services at around the same time.

Would you be in a position to share your friend and ex-shipmates stories of his escape (in another topic perhaps in the chat area of the forum)? They would make interesting reading!

Thomas

[June Ingram]

It does not appear that Boris called them sister ships. 

[Twynkle]

Highlander's initial post with the report investigating the break in the pipe makes interesting reading and as mentioned before as it had not been for the ingenious action taken by engineers the safety of QE2 was in question. 

http://www.maib.gov.uk/cms_resources/qe2.pdf

Hi Lynda - It does indeed!
Thanks to Ken for posting.
Just wishing that we could find the results of the  final Lloyds' Survey as well as a good copy of QE2's Deck Plans.
Please, did anyone by any chance make copies of both, or either document?
Sorry - this post is also somewhat off topic!
Rosie.