When RMS Empress of Ireland suffered a severe collision with another ship near the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River on May 28, 1914, she sank in only 14 minutes. Of the 1,477 onboard, 1,012 died. This is the story of Canada's Titanic. 🧵1/14 - ThreadSky

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social • 11 days ago

When RMS Empress of Ireland suffered a severe collision with another ship near the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River on May 28, 1914, she sank in only 14 minutes.
Of the 1,477 onboard, 1,012 died.
This is the story of Canada's Titanic.

🧵1/14

Comments

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social•11 days ago

Empress of Ireland was part of the Canadian Pacific Steamships line, meant to transport immigrants from Europe to Canada. The ship's keel was laid down on April 10, 1905. When finished, she was 170 metres long and had a service speed of 18 knots.

🧵2/14

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social•11 days ago

She was built with ten watertight bulkheads but they had to be closed manually. She could accommodate 1,542 passengers in three classes and had about 373 crew members.
She launched on Jan. 27, 1906 and took her maiden voyage on June 29, 1906.

🧵3/14

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social•11 days ago

Over the next eight years, she made 95 round trip crossings from Quebec City to Liverpool, accommodating almost 200,000 passengers.
After the Titanic disaster, all of her lifesaving equipment was updated, including 16 steel lifeboats and 24 collapsible lifeboats.

🧵4/14

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social•11 days ago

On May 28, 1914, she left Quebec City for Liverpool at 4:30 p.m. She had 1,057 passengers. Second class was mostly filled with Salvation Army members on their way to the Salvation Army Congress in London.
Captain Henry Kendall was in command of the ship.

🧵5/14

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social•11 days ago

In the early hours of May 29, Empress of Ireland was in the St. Lawrence near Pointe-au-Pere as fog rolled in.
At the same time, the Norwegian collier SS Storstad entered the fog in the opposite direction.
The two ships communicated with their whistles.

🧵6/14

cdnhistoryehx.bsky.social•11 days ago

At 1:56 a.m., the Storstad crashed into the starboard side of Empress of Ireland. The collision left a gaping hole right in the middle of the Empress. While the Storstad captain tried to keep his ship against the Empress to plug the hole, the current separated them.

🧵7/14

Comments

Posting Rules

Reply