Berlin (ship, 1925)

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Berlin
expiring New York 1957
expiring New York 1957
Ship data
flag SwedenSweden Sweden Germany
GermanyGermany 
other ship names
  • Gripsholm
Ship type Passenger ship
home port Bremen
Owner NDL
Shipyard Armstrong Whitworth & Co.
Whereabouts canceled
Ship dimensions and crew
length
175.10 (Lüa)
  • after reconstruction in 1949: 179.83 mm ( Lüa )
width 22.65 m
Draft Max. 5.81 m
measurement 17,993 GRT / 10,282 NRT
  • Newly measured in 1937 with 18,134 GRT
  • after reconstruction in 1949: 19,105 GRT
  • than Berlin : 18,600 GRT
 
crew 360, as Berlin 354
Machine system
machine 2 × diesel engine
Machine
performance
8,000 PS (5,884 kW)
Top
speed
17 kn (31 km / h)
propeller 2
Transport capacities
Permitted number of passengers Originally:
  • 127 in 1st class
  • 482 in 2nd class
  • 948 in 3rd class

after renovation in 1949:

  • 210 in 1st class
  • 710 in the tourist class

than Berlin :

  • 251 in 1st class
  • 725 in 2nd class

after renovation 1955:

  • 98 in 1st class
  • 878 in tourist class (later reduced to 725)

The passenger ship Berlin sailed from 1955 to 1966 under the flag of the Federal Republic of Germany . It was built in 1924 at Armstrong Whitworth & Co. ( Newcastle upon Tyne ) for the Svenska America Lines as Gripsholm .

history

The Gripsholm

Commissioned as Gripsholm in 1925

The ship put into service for Svenska Amerika Linien in 1925 under the name Gripsholm was the first passenger ship in the North Atlantic liner service with a diesel engine drive and the sister ship of the also engine-powered Kungsholm . During the Second World War , Sweden made the ship available to the International Committee of the Red Cross for the exchange of wounded and prisoners between the warring parties from 1940 to 1946 . In March 1946, the passenger ship resumed service between Gothenburg and New York .

1949 remodeling and modernization

At the Howaldtswerke shipyard in Kiel , the conversion and modernization of the Gripsholm took place from 1949 to 1950 . On July 18, 1952, the ship rescued the crew of the Norwegian freighter Black Hawk , which had caught fire . In 1954, the shipping company Norddeutscher Lloyd (NDL) acquired 50 percent of the owner's shares in the ship, which began its first voyage for the Bremen-America Line in Bremen on February 1, 1954 .

Postage stamp (1955) launched in the year of renaming

Renamed Berlin in 1955

On January 7, 1955, the North German Lloyd (NDL) took over the ship completely and renamed it Berlin . Initially, the ship was used in liner service between Bremerhaven and New York before it was rebuilt again in the same year. The Berlin was also used on several cruises in the North Atlantic . After a trip Bremerhaven - New York - Bermuda - New York - Bremerhaven in the spring of 1966, during which there had been several incidents, the Berlin was shut down.

Established in 1966 and scrapped

On October 15, 1966, the Berlin was finally decommissioned. In January 1966 it was replaced by the Europa (built as Kungsholm in 1953 ). The Berlin was sold to La Spezia in Italy for scrapping .

The Berlin was a solidly built ship that, due to its low height, lay well in the water and did not tend to roll. When she had a violent grounding under the command of George H. Will while leaving the port of St. George on the Bermuda Islands in 1966, the hull survived it without leaking. On the way back, a fire broke out in the crew quarters in front of Ireland, which could only be brought under control after a good half an hour. Because of its old age, the ship had numerous minor defects. So was z. B. the gland of the starboard propeller shaft is leaking, and constant medium amounts of water penetrated. The ship's engine was still largely lubricated by hand. The crew quarters were spartan. She typically needed 11 days to cross the Atlantic from Bremerhaven to New York. For comparison: the United States took less than five days for the same trip.

From 1954 to 1959 the captains of the Berlin were Heinrich Lorenz , H. Vollmers, KO Efferoth and from 1965 George H. Will.

literature

  • Hans-Georg Rammelt: “Berlin” on all seas: ships from three centuries . Brandenburgisches Verlagshaus, Berlin 1996, ISBN 3-89488-106-2 .
  • Special issue “750 Years of Berlin”: Panorama maritim. In: Bulletin of the GDR Working Group for Shipping and Naval History , No. 21, 1987
  • Gert Uwe Detlefsen : Shipping in the picture Baltic ferry ships . Hauschild Verlag, Bremen 1997, ISBN 978-3-89757-372-7
  • Harald Focke : The journey of death of BERLIN. Four men went overboard in the hurricane . In: Men from Morgenstern , Heimatbund an Elbe and Weser estuary e. V. (Ed.): Niederdeutsches Heimatblatt . No. 837 . Nordsee-Zeitung GmbH, Bremerhaven September 2019, p. 1 ( digital copy [PDF; 2.5 MB ; accessed on October 10, 2019]).

See also

Web links

Commons : Gripsholm  - collection of images, videos and audio files