Technical report

Salvage of the USS Lafayette (SS Normandie) US Navy Technical Report 35min

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• published: 18 Aug 2012
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more at http://quickfound.net/links/military_news_and_links.html "SALVAGE OPERATIONS FROM TIME OF THE FIRE TO DRYDOCKING THE SHIP. WORK OF SALVAGE ENGINEERS AND DIVERS, DESIGN AND PLACEMENT OF PATCHES, SHORING DECKS AND BULKHEADS, PLACEMENT OF PUMPS, STOPPING LEAKS WITH CONCRETE, AND MOORING THE SHIP DURING PUMPING." Public domain film from the National Archives, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied. The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Normandie SS Normandie was an ocean liner built in Saint-Nazaire, France, for the French Line Compagnie Générale Transatlantique. She entered service in 1935 as the largest and fastest passenger ship afloat; she is still the most powerful steam turbo-electric-propelled passenger ship ever built. Her novel design and lavish interiors led many to consider her the greatest of ocean liners. Despite this, she was not a commercial success and relied partly on government subsidy to operate. During service as the flagship of the CGT, she made 139 transatlantic crossings westbound from her home port of Le Havre to New York and one fewer returns. Normandie held the Blue Riband for the fastest transatlantic crossing at several points during her service career, during which the RMS Queen Mary was her main rival. During World War II, Normandie was seized by US authorities at New York and renamed USS Lafayette. In 1942, the liner caught fire while being converted to a troopship, capsized onto her port side and came to rest on the mud of the Hudson River at the New York Passenger Ship Terminal. Although salvaged at great expense, restoration was deemed too costly and she was scrapped in October 1946... The beginnings of Normandie can be traced to the Roaring Twenties when shipping companies began looking to replace veterans such as the RMS Mauretania which had first sailed in 1907... On 29 October 1932 -- three years to the day after the stock market crash -- Normandie was launched in front of 200,000 spectators. The 27,567-ton hull that slid into the Loire River was the largest launched and the wave crashed into a few hundred people, but with no injury. The ship was christened by Madame Andre Lebrun, wife of Albert Lebrun, the President of the French Republic. Normandie was outfitted until early 1935, her interiors, funnels, engines, and other fittings put in to make her into a working vessel. Finally, in May 1935, Normandie was ready for trials, which were watched by reporters. The superiority of Vladimir Yourkevitch's hull was visible: hardly a wave was created off the bulbous bow. The ship reached a top speed of 32.125 knots (59.496 km/h) and performed an emergency stop from that speed in 1,700 meters (5,577 ft)... The Normandie held the size record until the arrival of RMS Queen Elizabeth (83,673 gross tons) in 1940... On 12 December 1941, five days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Coast Guard removed Captain Herve Lehude and his crew and took possession of the Normandie under the right of angary, maintaining steam in the boilers, a fire watch, and other activities on the idled vessel... On 20 December 1941, the Auxiliary Vessels Board officially recorded President Franklin D. Roosevelt's approval of the Normandie's transfer to the US Navy. Plans called for the vessel to be turned into a troopship ("convoy unit loaded transport"). The Navy renamed her USS Lafayette, in honor both of Marquis de la Fayette the French general who fought on the Colonies' behalf in the American Revolution... At 14:30 on 9 February 1942, sparks from a welding torch used by Clement Derrick ignited a stack of life vests filled with flammable kapok that had been stored in the first-class lounge. The woodwork had not yet been removed, and the fire spread rapidly... The ship was stripped of superstructure and righted in 1943 in the world's most expensive salvage operation. One of the largest operations of its kind in history succeeded in righting Lafayette on 7 August 1943. She was reclassified to an aircraft and transport ferry, APV-4, on 15 September 1943 and placed in drydock the following month. Extensive damage to her hull, however, deterioration of her machinery, and the necessity for employing manpower on other more critical war projects prevented resumption of the conversion program, with the cost of restoring her determined to be too great... She was cut up for scrap beginning in October 1946 at Port Newark, New Jersey, and completely scrapped by 31 December 1948...