Pride of Atlantic limps into ships' graveyard

By Sebastien Berger in the Malacca Straits

(Filed: 29/04/2006)

The ship that was once the pride of France's transatlantic passenger fleet lay rusting off the Malaysian coast yesterday, waiting to die.

The SS France, the last purpose-built ocean liner and the longest in the world when it was launched by Yvonne de Gaulle, the general's wife, in 1960, is destined for the breakers.

Its fate has caused chagrin among enthusiasts and alarm to environmentalists, who say tons of asbestos-contaminated materials on board make dismantling it hazardous.

Even when the keel was laid down, aircraft were already carrying more people across the Atlantic than ships could cope with, but the 1,035ft liner took almost 600,000 people between New York and Le Havre in style before being taken out of service in the 1970s.

Sold and refurbished as the SS Norway, it was a Caribbean cruise ship until being crippled by a boiler room explosion that killed seven people in Miami three years ago.

First the ship was towed to Germany for possible repairs and at the end of last year was taken to Asia. A spokesman for the Malaysian owners, Star Cruises, yesterday confirmed that the craft - now called the Blue Lady - had been sold for breaking.

A Bangladeshi ship-breaker, Haji Lokman Hossain, announced that he had bought the vessel for £7.5 million. It is now anchored a few miles off Pulau Carey on Malaysia's west coast, dwarfing passing container ships. The prow rises almost vertically from the placid waters and the superstructure towers 11 storeys high, its distinctive winged funnels visible from shore.

But great streaks of rust stain the once-proud blue hull and where thousands of passengers and crew mingled there is not a sign of life.

"It's very sad," said Jan-Olav Storli, a Norwegian who travelled as a passenger, then a deck hand, before rising to be one of her navigation officers. "When you sail into the sunrise and look out over that long bow it's an unbelievable experience. Nothing will ever be built like her."

Story taken from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/04/29/wfrance29.xml