#clyde built

On January 9th 1972 The Liner , launched at John Brown’s shipyard, Clydebank, in 1938, caught fire and capsized.

After the decline of the big liners and it’s retirement the ship was sold to the city of Long Beach, California, US. It was sold to a succession of buyers, most of whom had unsuccessful plans for her.

Finally the Elizabeth was sold to Hong Kong businessman Tung Chao Yung, who intended to convert her into a floating university cruise ship now called the Seawise University. In 1972, while undergoing refurbishment in Hong Kong harbour, fire broke out aboard under unexplained circumstances and the ship was capsized by the water used to fight the fire.

One comment I found while researching this claimed "It was arson, 4 fires breaking out simultaneously isn't a coincidence"

The Ship was also featured in "The Spy who loved me" starring Roger Moore.

On January 9th 1972 The Liner Queen Elizabeth I, launched at John Brown's shipyard, Clydebank, in 1938, caught fire and capsized.

After the decline of the big liners and it's retirement the ship was sold to the city of Long Beach, California, US. It was sold to a succession of buyers, most of whom had unsuccessful plans for her.

Finally the Elizabeth was sold to Hong Kong businessman Tung Chao Yung, who intended to convert her into a floating university cruise ship now called the Seawise University. In 1972, while undergoing refurbishment in Hong Kong harbour, fire broke out aboard under unexplained circumstances and the ship was capsized by the water used to fight the fire.

On January 9th 1972 The Liner Queen Elizabeth I, launched at John Brown's shipyard, Clydebank, in 1938, caught fire and capsized.

After the decline of the big liners and it's retirement the ship was sold to the city of Long Beach, California, US. It was sold to a succession of buyers, most of whom had unsuccessful plans for her.

Finally the Elizabeth was sold to Hong Kong businessman Tung Chao Yung, who intended to convert her into a floating university cruise ship now called the Seawise University. In 1972, while undergoing refurbishment in Hong Kong harbour, fire broke out aboard under unexplained circumstances and the ship was capsized by the water used to fight the fire.

On October 2nd 1947 the paddle steamer Waverley was launched from A. & J. Inglis’s yard on the Clyde.

The Waverley is the last sea-going passenger paddle steamer anywhere in the world. She was named after the debut novel of Sir Walter Scott, but wasn’t the first paddle steamer to bear the name. The previous Waverley, built in 1899, had been requisitioned as a minesweeper during World War II and sank during the Dunkirk evacuation in 1940.

Materials were so scarce in post-war Britain that the new Waverley had to wait more than three months after her launch to have the boiler and engines installed. She finally entered service in June 1947, sailing a scenic route up Loch Long to Arrochar.

Ownership of the Waverley passed to the Caledonian Steam Packet Company in 1948. Between 1949 and 1964 she had a variety of winter duties, often replacing another ship that was being overhauled, or she was the spare vessel ready to cover for others in an emergency. In the main season, her routes were extended to include the Isle of Arran in 1953 and from 1958 onwards, there was also a cruise up the Clyde to Glasgow. By 1970, she was the last seagoing paddle steamer in the world. By 1971, Waverley was one of only two large excursion vessels left on the Clyde and was based at Gourock. In 1973, CSP became part of Caledonian MacBrayne Ltd

Waverley was sold on 8 August 1974 to the Paddle Steamer Preservation Society and refitted for the Waverley Steam Navigation Company. In 1975, she re-entered service on the Clyde, sailing at weekends from Glasgow and in mid-week from Ayr. In 1977, she spent a week on excurisions from Liverpool and the success of this led to over a month being spent on the South Coast in the following year. In 1981, she was fitted with a new boiler and embarked on her first full season of Round Britain cruising, with the peak summer weeks spent back on the Clyde.

In her 1990/91 winter refit, the paddle wheels were replaced and a major £7m two-stage rebuild was undertaken in early 2000 and winter 2002/03 in Great Yarmouth with the support of the National Heritage Lottery Fund. Waverley continues to be maintained in excellent condition and is the last seagoing paddle steamer in the world, fully restored and painted in her original LNER colours.

On January 9th 1972 The Liner Queen Elizabeth I, launched at John Brown’s shipyard, Clydebank, in 1938, caught fire and capsized.

The liners' role as a luxury cruise ship was short-lived - with the outbreak of the Second World War the following year, the Queen Elizabeth entered service in February 1940 as a troopship and didn’t return to her original role until October 1946.

Named after Queen Elizabeth, who was the Queen Consort to King George VI at the time, it was a designed after the legendary Queen Mary with a few extra improvements. One of the changes was its size, which at 1,031 feet long made it the largest passenger liner for a total of 56 year,s as well as being the largest riveted ship by gross tonnage. Point being, this thing was massive.

It was used for its intended purpose of an ocean liner until October of 1946 because prior to that was used as a troopship in WWII. It would eventually be replaced by Queen Elizabeth 2 in 1969 because it was smaller and more economical to operate.

The original Queen Elizabeth was sold to a few different buyers before falling into the hands of a Hong Kong businessman who had plans to refurbish the massive ship and turn it into a floating university. However, in 1972 while under construction, it mysteriously caught fire and the water used to put out the fire actually capsized the ship. The following year she was deemed a loss and was scrapped where she lay.

A couple of wee add ons about the Queen Elizabeth:

Parker Pen Company produced a special edition of 5,000 pens made from material recovered from the wreck in a presentation box and these are highly collectible.

The Queen Elizabeth,  acted as a top-secret MI6 base in the Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun.

On 16th June 1947 the Paddle Steamer Waverley made her maiden voyage.

The first photograph was taken 75 years ago today It shows the brand new Paddle Steamer Waverley approaching Dunoon for the second time in her long career. Having left her base at Craigendoran at 08:45 that morning she took the service run down to Rothesay, coming back up as far as Dunoon. 

Thereafter, she carried on northwards into Loch Long and Loch Goil to make her maiden calls at Lochgoilhead and Arrochar. At the latter pier passengers could disembark and connect with the Loch Lomond paddle steamers at Tarbet. As a result this service was called the 'Three Lochs Tour' and it was this route more than any other that was the raison-d'etre of P.S. Waverley, the last in a very, very long line of Clyde paddle steamers.

Built in 1946 by A & J Inglis, the Waverley, named for Sir Walter Scott’s novel of the same name, was launched on 2nd October 1946 and saw her trials over the Skelmorlie Measured Mile in early June 1947 with full bunkers and water tanks and added weight sufficient to simulate a 50% maximum passenger load.

She was given a celebratory send off with a piper in Glasgow before retracing her first voyage.

The Waverley is the last remaining sea-going paddle steamer in the world, and is part of the National Historic Fleet as a ‘vessel of pre-eminent national importance’.

She was in danger of being decommissioned in the early Seventies, but in 1974 she was bought by enthusiasts from the Paddle Steamer Preservation Society (PSPS) for the bargain price of just one pound from her then-owners Caledonian MacBrayne.

She underwent a major rebuild between 2000 and 2003, and passengers can still go ‘doon the watter’ on the Clyde from Glasgow to Dunoon and the isles of Bute and Arran during the summer months.

The vessel only sailed for two weeks last year due to the pandemic and a crash at Brodick in which 24 of the 239 passengers and crew were injured. She has suffered a number of previous incidents including a serve grounding that badly damaged her in 1977 as well as hitting a breakwater in 2009 and a similar accident hitting another dock in 2017.

It was announced a man who had been on board when it ploughed into the pier on Arran had received a five-figure pay-out after suffering a broken arm - one of three out of court settlements. An undisclosed number of other cases are still being pursued.

And although the world has certainly changed around the Waverley, the experience of stepping aboard and being charmed by the ship and the sights of Scotland's west coast remains more or less the same, 75 years on.

The Waverley is far from immune to the record high fuel prices across the UK, meaning the paddle steamer racks up a huge bill every day she sails, sparking concerns for the years ahead.

On January 9th 1972 The Liner Queen Elizabeth I, launched at John Brown's shipyard, Clydebank, in 1938, caught fire and capsized.

After the decline of the big liners and it's retirement the ship was sold to the a company called The Queen Corporation and ended  up in Florida opening as a tourist attraction, the venture however failed to make money and was closed within a year.. It was sold to a succession of buyers, most of whom had unsuccessful plans for her.

Finally the Elizabeth was sold to Hong Kong businessman Tung Chao Yung, who intended to convert her into a floating university cruise ship now called the Seawise University. In 1972, while undergoing refurbishment in Hong Kong harbour, fire broke out aboard under unexplained circumstances and the ship was capsized by the water used to fight the fire. 

May 27th 1936 saw the maiden voyage of liner Queen Mary.

According to legend while the Cunard-White Star Line’s new Hull Number 534 was under construction at the John Brown and Company’s shipworks on the Clyde no women were allowed anywhere near it in case a feminine presence should distract a male worker from a delicate task at a critical moment. There were in fact many problems, but in the end the new vessel was formally launched with all proper ceremony in pouring rain on September 26th, 1934, it would be two years before she would actually be able to take passengers. By May 1936 she was at last in Southampton ready for her maiden voyage to Cherbourg and then across the Atlantic. Supplies loaded included 50,000 lbs of fresh meat, 50,000 eggs, 14,500 bottles of wine and 25,000 packets of cigarettes.

Excited crowds watched the ship leave, a band played and an armada of vessels escorted her out of Southampton harbour. Fog prevented any hope of an Atlantic passage in record time and the ship was found to roll alarmingly and require far more handrails. At its worst, apparently, you could walk along a corridor with one foot on the wall.