Gavião (ship, 1897)
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The Gavião (Eng. "Falcon") was a Portuguese cargo and passenger ship built in 1897, which was used in the coastal shipping of the Madeira archipelago . The Gavião was due to its size and long service lives of the most famous coastal steamer.
Construction and technical data
The ship was in 1897 at the Victoria Shipyard Shipyard company Ramage & Ferguson in Leith (Scotland) under the hull number 151 attached to Kiel . The hull was made of composite , the outer skin was planked with wood. The launch took place on May 5, 1897 under the name Gavião , the completion and delivery to Charles Blandy ( London and Funchal ) took place in June 1897.
According to information in Portuguese literature, its length was 34 meters, according to shipyard information 29.23 meters (original information: 95.92 ft), according to the shipyard it was 6.40 meters (21.0 ft) wide and had a draft of 2.80 Meters (9.2 ft). The ship was measured with 102 GRT or 60 NRT. The drive consisted of a two-cylinder, two-fold expansion machine from Ramage & Ferguson, the output of which was 29 nominal horsepower (nhp) and acted on one screw . After the Second World War , the machine was replaced by a diesel engine, about which no further information is available.
history
The new owner, Charles Blandy, initially registered the ship in Leith (Scotland) . The steamer left its home port on June 14, 1897 and drove to Madeira via Plymouth . There he was registered under the flag of Portugal with home port Funchal. In 1901, JE Martins from Funchal was registered as the owner.
On Madeira, the Gavião connected Funchal and its seaport with the island's small coastal towns from 1897 to around the middle of the 20th century. Until the expansion of the road network for car traffic, coastal shipping on Madeira played an important role in the transport of goods and people, as transport by ship was often much easier than by land, with often rugged mountain roads. Foreign goods were imported via Funchal and distributed by ship to the individual coastal towns, local products - such as wine from the north coast - took the opposite route. Until the end of the 19th century, coastal shipping took place with sailing and rowing boats ("carreireiros"), then gradually small steamships such as the Gavião , Açor , Bútio and Falcão took over this task. At the same time, from the second half of the 19th century, quays were built at many coastal locations that made it easier to load and unload ships.
In addition to its trips on the island's coastal traffic, the steamer made excursions to the neighboring island of Porto Santo in the summer months from the 1930s to the late 1940s . These trips did not take place as a line connection, but connected the two islands irregularly.
Large parts of the history of the steamer, on the other hand, are unclear: there are indications of a conversion between the 1920s and 1940s, but also that the ship is said to have sunk during a storm in 1926. In addition, the steamer is said to have operated beyond the Madeira archipelago to Ponta Delgada in the Azores . In addition to its size and long service life, the steamer also gained fame due to its aid missions for ships in distress off the coast.
At the beginning of 1950, the Gavião was replaced by the smaller and less motorized, but more modern and more maneuverable Milano in the small ports . The old steamer was scrapped in Funchal.
literature
- Madeira Story Center (Editor): Madeira. A short illustrated story , Edition Pedro Ornelas, Funchal / Madeira 2009, ISBN 978-989-95535-0-7 .
- Victor Caires: Crónicas da Beira-Mar , Edição Empresa Municipal “Funchal 500 Anos”, Funchal / Madeira 2008, ISBN 978-989-95637-4-2 ( online version ).
Web links
- Gavião at clydeships.co.uk , accessed December 5, 2019
- Photo of the Gavião at www3.uma.pt , accessed December 5, 2019
- Pictures of the Gavião at lmcshipsandthesea.blogspot.com , accessed on December 5, 2019
- Photo of the Gavião at restosdecoleccao , accessed December 5, 2019
- Photo collection on ship connections between Funchal and Porto Santo , accessed on December 5, 2019
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Madeira Story Center, p. 49
- ↑ a b c d Caires: Crónicas da Beira-Mar , pp. 93f.
- ↑ a b Gavião at clydeships.co.uk
- ↑ a b Photo of the Gavião at restosdecoleccao
- ↑ a b Photo of the Gavião at www3.uma.pt
- ^ Advertisement for the Gavião's voyage to Porto Santo in "Diario de Noticias" of November 19, 1911
- ↑ Photo collection on ship connections between Funchal and Porto Santo
- ↑ Background information on two paintings by the Gavião