(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) On January 27, 1949 the Chinese steamer Taiping sank after a collision with another vessel en route to Taiwan leading to the deaths of over 1500 passengers and crew combined. The ship was packed to nearly twice capacity with over 1,000 refugees fleeing Communism after the Chinese Civil War traveling from Shanghai to Keelung. Some estimates put…
(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) Fire broke out on the Indonesian car ferry TampoMas II off Kalimantan. The official death toll was 431, but with many passengers unregistered or traveling without tickets, the final figure was never known. The ship carried dozens of motor vehicles, including a SAKAI steam roller, Vespa scooters, etc., which were parked in the car deck.…
(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) Until the “Titanic” sank in 1912, the tragedy of the Hapag steamship “Cimbria” was regarded as the largest civilian maritime disaster of all time. To this day, the catastrophe remains the biggest civilian maritime drama in German waters. The collision made headlines across the world. The story of the iron screw steamship that sank…
(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) MS Norman Atlantic is a roll-on/roll-off passenger (ROPAX) ferry owned by the Italian ferry company Visemar di Navigazione. The ferry was chartered by ANEK Lines from December 2014. On 28 December 2014, she caught fire in the Strait of Otranto, in the Adriatic Sea. The bodies of nine victims (three Greek, two Italian, two German, a Georgian and a Turkish passenger) were…
(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) The two warships, the HMS St. George and the HMS Defence, both part of the British Baltic fleet, ran aground and were lost outside Thorsminde at the west-coast of Jutland on the 24th of December 1811. The disaster took place during the wars with England in which the St. George were Admiral Reynolds’ flagship. The St. George together…
(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) With an estimated death toll of 4,386 people, the collision resulted in the deadliest peacetime maritime disaster in history. Doña Paz was traveling from Leyte island to the Philippine capital of Manila. While most of the passengers slept in the fatal night, the Doña Paz collided with MT Vector, an oil tanker en route from Bataan to Masbate. The Vector was carrying 8,800…
(http://www.MaritimeCyprus.com) The ‘Salem Express’ was launched in France in 1966 under the name ‘Fred Scamaroni’ and was a roll-on, roll-off ferry for vehicles and passengers in the Mediterranean. She was 100m long and 18m wide. In 1988 she was sold to the Samatour Shipping Company and started running trips between Safaga and Jeddah under the name ‘Salem Express’. On the 17th of December…
