Tasmania (ship)
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The Tasmania was a passenger ship of the British shipping company Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O), which carried passengers , mail and cargo on a regular service from Europe via the Suez Canal to India between 1884 and 1887 . On April 17, 1887, the Tasmania crashed on the southwest coast of the island of Corsica on the offshore rocks of Les Moines (Corsican I Munacci, English Monachi Rocks) and became a total loss. 35 people were killed.
The ship
The 4,488 GRT steamship Tasmania was built in 1884 in the Scottish port city of Greenock at the Caird & Company shipyard . It was launched on May 17, 1884 with construction number 237 and was completed on June 27, 1884. The owner was the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. Ltd. (P&O), a British shipping company headquartered in London . This was also Tasmania's home port .
The ship was 121.9 meters long, 13.7 meters wide and had a maximum draft of 7.6 meters. The two-cylinder compound steam engines from Caird & Company, which propelled a single screw, developed 5,195 PSi and ensured a speed of 14 knots.
She was the first of four new sister ships to be completed . The others were the Chusan (1884), the Coromandel (1885) and the Bengal (1886). The four new passenger steamers were comfortably equipped and had electric lights in the passenger quarters; They were also equipped with watertight doors that could be closed at the push of a button. They were built in such a way that in the event of war they could be quickly converted into auxiliary cruisers or troop transports .
The last ride
In April 1887, the Tasmania was under the command of Captain Charles Perrin on a voyage from Bombay to Marseille . She had 180 passengers and crew on board. The Maharajah of Jodhpur had been a passenger on the voyage but had disembarked in Suez . He left six boxes with precious stones on the ship, which he planned to follow later.
On April 17th, the steamer ran aground on the southwest coast of Corsica near Roccapina on the offshore rocks of Les Moines (Corsican I Munacci, English Monachi Rocks). The captain, the fifth officer, one of the helmsmen and 32 other crew members were killed when the ship was evacuated. All passengers were rescued and taken to Marseille by two French ships. The British survivors were brought back to Great Britain from Marseille on one of the Tasmania's sister ships , the Chusan .
The British marine painter William Lionel Wyllie captured the wreck of the Tasmania in several pictures.
literature
- Charles Finidori, Le "Tasmania" de Bombay aux récifs des Moines, à trois milles de Roccapina , A. Piazzola, 1993, ISBN 2907161156
Web links
- Overview of technical data for Tasmania in the Clydebuilt Ships Database
- The Tasmania in a list of sunken P&O ships ( memento from June 8, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
- Brief summary of Tasmania on www.wrecksite.eu
- Article in the New York Times April 19, 1887
- Entry in the ship directory Miramar Ship Index