History | |
---|---|
United Kingdom | |
Name | RMS Rangitata |
Owner | New Zealand Shipping Company |
Port of registry | Plymouth |
Builder | John Brown & Company, Clydebank |
Yard number | 517 |
Launched | 26 March 1929 |
Fate | Scrapped in 1962 |
General characteristics | |
Type | Ocean liner |
Tonnage | 16,737 GRT, 10,315 NRT |
Length | 531.0 ft (161.8 m) |
Beam | 70.2 ft (21.4 m) |
Draught | 33 feet 9 inches (10.29 m) |
Depth | 38.1 ft (11.6 m) |
Propulsion |
|
Speed |
|
RMS Rangitata was an ocean passenger liner that was built in Scotland in 1929 and scrapped in Yugoslavia in 1962. [1] She was operated by the New Zealand Shipping Company between London and Wellington, New Zealand, via the Panama Canal with her two sister ships Rangitiki and Rangitane. [2]
In World War II, in 1940 Rangitata sailed from Liverpool with 113 evacuated children under the Children's Overseas Reception Board (CORB) scheme on 28 August 1940, bound for New Zealand through the Panama Canal in convoy OB 205, with Volendam which was carrying children bound for Canada, and was torpedoed, with 113 CORB children arriving safely in New Zealand.
She also served as a troopship, for example in Convoy US1 taking New Zealand troops to the Middle East in January 1940. [3] She had returned to civilian service by 1949.
Alan-A-Dale was cargo motor ship that was built in Denmark in 1938 as Nordvest. In the Second World War the United States requisitioned her in 1941 and renamed her Alan-A-Dale. In 1944 she was sunk by enemy action off the coast of the Netherlands.
SS Ceramic was a steam ocean liner built in Belfast for White Star Line in 1912–13 and operated on the Liverpool – Australia route. Ceramic was the largest ship serving the route until P&O introduced RMS Mooltan in 1923.
SS City of Benares was a British steam turbine ocean liner, built for Ellerman Lines by Barclay, Curle & Co of Glasgow in 1936. During the Second World War, City of Benares was used as an evacuee ship to transport 90 children from Britain to Canada. The ship was torpedoed and sunk in September 1940 by the German submarine U-48 with the loss of 258 people out of a complement of 406, including the death of 77 of the evacuated children. The sinking caused such public outrage in Britain that it led to Winston Churchill cancelling the Children's Overseas Reception Board (CORB) plan to relocate British children abroad.
SS Cambridge was a refrigerated steam cargo liner that was built in Germany for the Hamburg America Line. She was launched in 1916 as Vogtland, but after the 1919 Treaty of Versailles the United Kingdom took her as war reparations and sold her to the Federal Steam Navigation Company, who renamed her Cambridge. She operated between Britain and Australasia until 1940, when a German mine sank her off the coast of Australia.
MS Rangitane was a passenger liner owned by the New Zealand Shipping Company. She was one of three sister ships delivered to the company in 1929 for the All-Red Route between Britain and New Zealand. Rangitane was built by John Brown & Company and launched on 27 May 1929.
SS Duchess of York was one of a class of four steam turbine ocean liners built in Glasgow in 1927–29 for Canadian Pacific Steamships Ltd's transatlantic service between Britain and Canada.
SS Tregenna was a cargo steamship that was launched in England in 1919 and sunk by a U-boat in the Battle of the Atlantic in 1940 with the loss of 33 of her 37 crew. She was laid down as War Bulldog, but the Hain Steam Ship Co bought her before she was completed and renamed her Tregenna.
The Children's Overseas Reception Board (CORB) was a British government sponsored organisation. The CORB evacuated 2,664 British children from England, so that they would escape the imminent threat of German invasion and the risk of enemy bombing in World War II. This was during a critical period in British history, between July and September 1940, when the Battle of Britain was raging, and German invasion forces were being amassed across the English Channel.
Cotati was a steam cargo ship built in 1918–1919 by Moore Shipbuilding and Drydock Company of Oakland for the United States Shipping Board (USSB) as part of the wartime shipbuilding program of the Emergency Fleet Corporation (EFC) to restore the nation's Merchant Marine. The vessel was briefly used for the first two years of her career to transport frozen meat between North and South America and Europe. The ship was subsequently laid up at the end of 1921 and remained part of the Reserve Fleet through the end of 1940. In January 1941 she was sold together with two other vessels to the New Zealand Shipping Co. and subsequently in 1942 was transferred to the Ministry of War Transport (MoWT) and renamed Empire Avocet. The ship was torpedoed and sunk by German submarine U-125 on 30 September 1942 on one of her regular wartime trips.
The New Zealand Shipping Company (NZSC) was a shipping company whose ships ran passenger and cargo services between Great Britain and New Zealand between 1873 and 1973.
SS Empire Chamois was a 5,864 GRT cargo ship which was built in 1918 by Ames Shipbuilding and Drydock Co, Seattle. She was ordered by the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique but was requisitioned by the United States Navy and commissioned as USS West Mount with the pennant number ID-3202 in 1918. She was decommissioned in May 1919 and passed to the United States Shipping Board (USSB) as SS Westmount. In 1927 she was sold to the Dimon Steamship Corporation and renamed SS Pacific Redwood. She returned to the USSB in 1932 and passed to the United States Maritime Commission (USMC) in 1937. In 1940, she was passed to the Ministry of Shipping, passing to the Ministry of War Transport in 1941 and being renamed SS Empire Chamois. She was sold to Astral Shipping Co Ltd in 1946 and renamed SS Granview. In 1949 she was sold to the Compagnia Maritime del Este, Panama and renamed SS Chamois, serving until 1958 when she was scrapped. She was the last Ames-built ship afloat.
USS West Mead (ID-3548), also spelled Westmead, was a United States Navy cargo ship in commission from 1918 to 1919.
MV Aorangi was a transpacific ocean liner and refrigerated cargo ship. She was launched in 1924 in Scotland and scrapped in 1953. Her regular route was between Sydney and Vancouver via Auckland, Suva and Honolulu.
SS Themistocles was a UK steam ocean liner and refrigerated cargo ship. She was launched in 1910 in Ireland and scrapped in 1947 in Scotland. She was built for Aberdeen Line, White Star Line managed her for a few years, and she spent the latter part of her career with Shaw, Savill & Albion Line.
SS Mohamed Ali El-Kebir, formerly SS Teno, was one of a pair of steam turbine ocean liners built in Scotland in 1922 for the Chilean company CSAV. She and her sister ship Aconcagua ran between Valparaíso and New York via the Panama Canal until 1932, when CSAV was hit by the Great Depression and surrendered the two ships to the Scottish shipbuilder Lithgows to clear a debt.
QSMV Dominion Monarch was a UK passenger and refrigerated cargo liner. Her name was a reference to the Dominion of New Zealand. The unusual prefix "QSMV" stood for quadruple-screw motor vessel.
Cokesit was a steam cargo ship built in 1918–1919 by Guy M. Standifer Construction Company of Vancouver for the United States Shipping Board as part of the wartime shipbuilding program of the Emergency Fleet Corporation (EFC) to restore the nation's Merchant Marine. The vessel was largely employed on the East Coast of the United States to Australia route until 1928 when she was laid up. In late 1937 the ship together with several other vessels was bid on and subsequently acquired next year by the Greek tramp operator John D. Chandris to carry cargo from Australia to Greece and United Kingdom. The freighter was also renamed Adelfoi Chandris. Following the surrender of France, the ship was interned in Dakar and passed into Vichy government hands in 1940 and renamed Saint Marin. Under the terms of Nevers Agreement she eventually was transferred to Italy and renamed Catania. In early August 1943 the vessel together with several other ships was bombed and damaged in Naples harbor by the Allied aircraft.
RMS Rangitiki was a passenger liner owned by the New Zealand Shipping Company. She was one of three sister ships delivered to the company in 1929 for the route between Britain and New Zealand. Rangitiki was built by John Brown & Company at Clydebank, Scotland and launched on 27 August 1928.
SS Rotorua was a New Zealand Shipping Company steam ocean liner and refrigerated cargo ship that was built in Scotland in 1910 and sunk by a U-boat in 1917.
SS Verdala was a cargo and passenger steamship that was built in Scotland in 1913. Several times she changed owners and was renamed: as Mongolian Prince in 1917, Istok in 1928 and finally Maycrest in 1940.