Asturias (ship, 1926)
.jpg) The Asturias on their test drives in 1926
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The RMS Asturias (II) was a 1926 commissioned passenger ship of the British shipping company Royal Mail Line , which was used in passenger and mail traffic from Great Britain to South America . During the Second World War , the ship served as an armed auxiliary cruiser until it was badly damaged by a submarine attack in 1943. The Royal Mail Line handed the ship over to the Royal Navy in 1945 . In 1957 the Asturias was scrapped in Scotland and previously served as a backdrop for a Titanic film adaptation.
The ship
The 22,048 RT large motor ship Asturias was built at Harland & Wolff in Belfast . She and her sister ship Alcantara (II) (22,181 GRT), built at the same shipyard, were the largest ships of the Royal Mail Line to date. It was not until 1939 that a larger ship was built with the RMS Andes (II) measuring 26,689 GRT . It was the name successor to the first Asturias, put into service in 1908 . The 203-meter-long and 23.9-meter-wide passenger and mail ship had two chimneys, two masts and two propellers and was powered by two eight-cylinder diesel engines from Burmeister & Wain , which developed 15,000 break horsepower (BHP) and allowed a top speed of 17 knots . The passenger accommodations were designed for 432 in the first, 223 in the second and 453 in the third class.
When she was launched on July 7, 1925, the Asturias was the largest motor ship in the world and the first ship of the Royal Mail Line with a cruiser stern. She was baptized by Rosalind, Duchess of Abercorn, wife of James Hamilton, 3rd Duke of Abercorn . The ship was completed on February 21, 1926 and five days later it ran under the command of Commodore EWE Morrison on its maiden voyage to Río de la Plata in Argentina. Right at the start of her service, it was found that the ship was slow and vibrated heavily. For this reason, two sets of Parsons steam turbines were installed, the bow got a new shape and the two propellers were replaced. These measures increased the speed to 20,000 Shaft Horsepower (SHP). The chimneys have also been lengthened for cosmetic reasons. The passenger cabins were also converted so that 330 passengers in the first, 220 in the second and 768 in the third class could be taken on board. In September 1934, the ship was able to return to service.
In addition to her regular scheduled trips, the Asturias was also occasionally used for cruises . She represented the Royal Mail Line at the Fleet Review in Spithead in 1935 on the occasion of the silver jubilee of King George V and Queen Mary .
Second World War
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Immediately after the outbreak of war in 1939, the Asturias was converted into an armed auxiliary cruiser (Armed Merchant Cruiser) at Harland & Wolff . The front chimney, which was just a dummy, was removed to make room for anti-aircraft guns . The entire movable interior of the ship was stored in a warehouse in Southampton , which was completely destroyed in an air raid in November 1940. For its defense, the ship was equipped with six old 155 mm cannons that were still from the First World War . The conversion was completed at the end of September 1939 and the Asturias was henceforth included in the North Atlantic Patrol , which had its base in Scapa Flow .
She provided this service until the end of 1941, when she was sent to Newport News Shipbuilding in Newport News (USA) to be rebuilt. An aircraft launch pad and a catapult were installed. To make room for this, the main mast and parts of the aft deck superstructure were removed. New cannons were also installed. In early 1942, the work was completed and the Asturias was sent to Freetown on the west coast of Africa to patrol the South Atlantic from now on . In the same year the British Admiralty bought a wooden floating dock in the USA and the Asturias was chosen to organize the transfer of the dock to Great Britain. However, the dock sank while sailing in the Atlantic .
Shortly before midnight on July 24, 1943, the Asturias was torpedoed in the South Atlantic about 400 nautical miles from Freetown by the Italian submarine Ammiraglio Cagni . The torpedo struck the engine room on the port side, killing four men. The ship was unable to maneuver but did not sink. Two smaller ships remained on site until the rescue tug Zwarte Zee arrived on July 26 and took the Asturias into tow to Freetown. The 793-ton Zwarte Zee was considered the most powerful tug in the world at the time.
On August 1, 1943, the two ships arrived in Freetown, where the Asturias was put aground and lay in the flooded engine room for the next 18 months until it was finally written off as a total loss by the Royal Mail Line. In February 1945 the ship was bought by the Royal Navy and transported by the tugs Zwarte Zee and Thames accompanied by seven corvettes to Gibraltar , where superficial repairs were carried out in the dry dock. The ship was then towed to Belfast, where it was extensively repaired by Harland & Wollf.
The last few years
From then on she served as a troop transport for the Ministry of War Transport (MoWT), while the Royal Mail Line took over management again. On October 12, 1946, the Asturias ran out of Southampton for their first troop voyage via Cape Town to Australia. From 1949 it was used (still under the supervision of the MoWT) in the emigration service to Australia. It was able to accommodate 160 passengers in first class, 113 in third class and a further 1134 travelers in dormitories. On July 26, 1949, she left for her first voyage to Australia with 1,340 emigrants on board. On December 10, 1949, she left Sydney for her second voyage, making a stopover in Jakarta , where she took Dutch citizens on board who were returning to Rotterdam . During this time, the ship was still painted in the identification colors of a troop ship. Only after the third voyage was the Asturias repainted in the colors of the Royal Mail Line.
In 1953, the Asturias was tasked with repatriating British troops from Korea . She filled this role for four years. In 1957 she was sold to Scotland for demolition and arrived in Faslane-on-Clyde on September 14, 1957 . The demolition company Thomas W. Ward Shipbreakers Ltd. made the Asturias available to the British film production company Rank Organization for their feature film The Last Night of the Titanic , which was based on Walter Lord's book A Night to Remember from 1955, before it was scrapped . While the demolition was already in progress on the starboard side, the lifeboat scenes were filmed on the port side. When the film was finished, the dismantling of the Asturias was also complete.