The Atalante was a Greek cruise ship . She was commissioned in 1953 as the Tahitien liner for the French Messageries Maritimes and has been in service for cruises since 1972. After a 51-year-long service which went Atalante in November 2004 to terminate the Indian Alang .
history
The Tahitia was built under the hull number ME2 in the shipyard of A&C de France in Dunkirk and was launched on October 10, 1952. After the takeover by Messageries Maritimes in April 1953, the ship took up the liner service between Marseille and French Polynesia on May 4, 1953 .
The Tahitia was used in scheduled service for almost 20 years until it became unprofitable in the early 1970s due to strong competition from aircraft. She was therefore offered for sale in 1972 together with other ships of the shipping company. In the same year, the Limassol- based shipping company Aphrodite Cruises (later Mediterranean Sun Cruises) acquired the ship, renamed it Atalante , converted it for cruises and continued to use it in the Mediterranean. In 1978 the Atalante was modernized. In 1991 she went under the name Homericus under charter to the Greek Epirotiki Lines in order to quickly replace the Oceanos, which was originally also built for Messageries Maritimes and sank in a storm in August 1991 . After this charter, it was renamed and launched again in Atalante .
In 1993 the Atalante was bought by Paradise Cruises and received an extensive renovation. Among other things, the superstructures were expanded to accommodate a new show lounge and additional cabins. It was then successfully used for Mediterranean cruises until the prices for scrap metal had risen so high in the summer of 2004 that the shipping company sold the 51-year-old ship for demolition due to its age and despite its good condition. After the end of her last cruise on November 1, 2004, the Atalante was transferred to Alang, India, and broken up there. Her sister ship Calédonia , which was commissioned in 1952 , was sold for demolition in 1974.
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