Twickenham Ferry (ship)
Twickenham Ferry was a railway ferry built in 1934 for the London company Southern Railway . She servedas a mine sweeper during World War II and returned to the rail ferry service after the war until 1974.
history
The Twickenham Ferry was built by Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson Ltd as yard number 1446 for the Southern Railway & Angleterre-Lorraine-Alsace and delivered on March 15, 1934. It was built for the Dover - Dunkirk route, but initially used from Southampton . In 1936 the flag was changed to France and her home port became Dunkirk. From October 1936 to August 25, 1939, she was then used as originally planned between Dover and Dunkirk and hauled the only continuous train route between London and Paris with the Night Ferry .
In 1939 she was converted into a mine sweeper, renamed HMS Twickenham and put into service for the Navy from July 1940. It could also transport a hospital train of 14 cars and four cars with the associated personnel. At the end of October 1945 it was used again under its original name and in 1947 it was switched from coal to oil firing. When British Railways was founded in 1948, Twickenham Ferry was registered with the British Transport Commission and was later given IMO number 5371478.
In May 1974 it was taken out of service and scrapped in Spain.
description
Twickenham Ferry was built as one of three structurally identical railway ferries, their home port was London. Her sister ships were called Hampton Ferry and Shepperton Ferry . She was 105.7 m long, had a draft of 4.1 m, was 18.5 m wide, was measured with 2,839 GRT, 1,044 NRT and had a deadweight of 1,200 dwt. It was driven by four Parsons steam turbines with a total output of 3,300 kW. The steam required for this was supplied by Yarrow boilers, and she had a service speed of 16 knots.
The ship could carry 12 sleeping cars or 40 freight cars with space for 25 cars and there were passenger facilities for 500 passengers.
literature
- Arnulf Hader: Railway ferries in the world . Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, 1986, ISBN 3-7822-0393-3 .