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U.S. Lines SS America Model

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One of the most famous American ocean liners was United States Lines 26,454-ton ship SS America, which was built in Newport News, Virginia.  Her interior was designed by Eggers and Higgins' architectural firm and by women of the Smyth, Urquhart, and Mackwald firm, and her sponsor was First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.  She was commissioned in 1940 and had a short prewar career, during which a German spy from the Duquesne ring boarded as the ship's butcher, though he was later found and arrested by the FBI.  SS America became the troopship USS West Point during World War II, carrying a record 350,000 troops.  After the war, she repatriated thousands of troops and carried war refugees such as Czech girl Marie Jana Korbelova, who would eventually become U.S. president Bill Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. 

SS America ended her United States Lines career after SS United States became the company's fastest ship, and the older liner was sold in 1964 to Greek shipping company Chandris Lines, ancestor of Celebrity Cruises, and renamed RHMS* Australis.  She was sold to Venture Cruises in 1978, renamed SS America, and put into service, but was in such abominable condition that 1200 passengers abandoned ship as soon as they began sailing out of New York, and the courts ordered the ship sold to pay off the line's debts.  SS America was repurchased by Chandris and renamed SS Italis for the 1979 tourist season, after which she was sold to the Intercommerce Corporation to be converted into the prison ship SS Noga, but was instead sold to yet another owner, Silver Moon Ferries, in 1984 and given the Arabic name SS Alferdoss.  She suffered a leak and almost sank, after which she was sold for scrap, but the scrappers defaulted on their payments and pulled out.

In 1993, SS Alferdoss was yet again resold, this time from Silver Moon Ferries to the Chaophraya Transport Company of Thailand for conversion to a hotel ship like RMS Queen Mary.  She still had a seaworthy hull, despite the partial scrapping and decrepit interior, so she was towed out of Piraeus, Greece by the Ukrainian tugboat Neftegaz-67 under the new name SS American Star.  Rather than sail through the Suez Canal to the Indian Ocean and then to Phuket, Neftegaz-67 tried taking the Atlantic Ocean route around Africa, but this being the winter of 1994 a storm struck the ships and snapped the ropes.  The tugboat crew boarded SS American Star, but could not keep it tied to Neftegaz-67 and had to be rescued by helicopter.  SS American Star drifted toward the Canary Islands and ran aground on Fuerteventura.  As the tugboat company, Chaophraya, and the insurance company argued over who should do what, nature ended the debate, breaking the old ship in half with powerful waves, and what remained of the ship that was SS America collapsed and sank.  This model of SS America is displayed at the Mariners Museum in Newport News, Virginia.

* Royal Hellenic Mail Ship, as Chandris had the Greek government's contract for mail on the Greece-Australia route.
Image size
3251x2222px 1.28 MB
Make
NIKON
Model
COOLPIX S6300
Shutter Speed
10/40 second
Aperture
F/3.2
Focal Length
5 mm
ISO Speed
400
Date Taken
Sep 12, 2014, 4:15:51 PM
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