A passenger ship is a merchant ship whose primary function is to carry passengers on the sea. The category does not include cargo vessels which have accommodations for limited numbers of passengers, such as the ubiquitous twelve-passenger freighters once common on the seas in which the transport of passengers is secondary to the carriage of freight. The type does however include many classes of ships designed to transport substantial numbers of passengers as well as freight. Indeed, until recently virtually all ocean liners were able to transport mail, package freight and express, and other cargo in addition to passenger luggage, and were equipped with cargo holds and derricks, kingposts, or other cargo-handling gear for that purpose. Only in more recent ocean liners and in virtually all cruise ships has this cargo capacity been eliminated.
40-1059: SS Wiltshire was a passenger ship built for the Federal Steam Navigation Company by John Brown's of Clydebank in 1912 to run between Britain, Australia and New Zealand. She was wrecked when she ran aground in 1922. SS Wiltshire was a sister ship of SS Argyllshire (1911–1936) and SS Shropshire (1911–1940), built a few months earlier. She had three main decks, four insulated holds (10,618 m (375,000 cu ft) refrigerated), 117 first-class berths and three- and four-berth cabins for 130 first-class and 270 emigrant passengers. Four boilers, for two sets of inverted surface condensing , quadruple expansion engines powered her maiden voyage from Liverpool to Melbourne , between 17 March and 27 April 1912 (35 days 17½ hours), via Cape Town (for coal), at an average of 13.5 knots (25.0 km/h; 15.5 mph). Wiltshire served Sydney for Federal, Huddart and Shire Lines, Bristol , Liverpool , Manchester and Wellington as
80-467: A Federal and Shire Lines ship, though she was also advertised as running for the parent company, New Zealand Shipping. In 1913, she was fitted with two guns in an Admiralty scheme to protect food carrying ships . In December 1913, a collision with a ship, whilst docking in Liverpool, required 3 months of repairs, replacing 10 plates, a propeller and a shaft. From 7 September 1914 to 27 December 1917 Wiltshire
120-437: A backup to electronic depth sounding in the event of malfunction. GPS has largely replaced the sextant and chronometer to establish one's position at sea, but many mariners still carry a sextant and chronometer as a backup. Many small craft still rely solely on a sounding line. The first practical fathometer (literally "fathom measurer"), which determined water depth by measuring the time required for an echo to return from
160-487: A given hull size. Passenger ships are subject to two major International Maritime Organization requirements : to perform musters of the passengers (...) within 24 hours after their embarkation and to be able to perform full abandonment within a period of 30 minutes from the time the abandon-ship signal is given . Transportation Research Board research from 2019 reported passenger vessels, much more than freight vessels, are subject to degradations in stability as
200-471: A half", "and a quarter", or "a quarter less"; thus 4 3/4 fathoms would be called as "a quarter less five", 3 1/2 as "and a half three", and so on. Where the depth was greater than 20 fathoms the line would commonly be marked with a single knot at 25 fathoms, two knots at 30, and so on. Soundings may also be taken to establish the ship's position as an aid in navigation , not merely for safety. Soundings of this type were usually taken using leads that had
240-408: A result of increases in lightship weight. Passenger vessels appear to be more pressing candidates for lightship weight-tracking programs than freight vessels. Passengers on ships without backup generators suffer substantial distress due to lack of water, refrigeration, and sewage systems in the event of loss of the main engines or generators due to fire or other emergency. Power is also unavailable to
280-502: A ship's GRT and displacement were somewhat similar in number. For example, Titanic , put in service in 1912, had a GRT of 46,328 and a displacement reported at over 52,000 tons. Similarly, Cunard Line's mid-1930s RMS Queen Mary and RMS Queen Elizabeth were of approximately 81,000 – 83,000 GRT and had displacements of over 80,000 tons. Today, due to changes in construction, engineering, function, architecture, and, crucially, measurement system – which measures functionally all of
320-522: A ship's internal volume, not just part of it – modern passenger ships' GT values are much higher than their displacements. The Cunard Queens' current successor, the 148,528 GT Queen Mary 2 , has been estimated to only displace approximately 76,000 tons. With the completion in 2009 of the first of the over 225,000 GT Oasis -class cruise ships, Oasis of the Seas , passenger ships' displacements rose to 100,000 tons, well less than half their GT. This new class
360-402: A tankard. The line was then used to set up a breeches buoy and haul all 103 crew members to safety, with the help of sailors from HMS Philomel . A large crowd welcomed the crew when they arrived at Auckland. Salvage work, using divers, continued for over a year and included seven of the eight propeller blades, each weighing two tons. In 1955, part of the wreck was 33 metres (108 ft) below
400-480: A wad of tallow in a concavity at the bottom of the plummet. The tallow would bring up part of the bottom sediment (sand, pebbles, clay, shells) and allow the ship's officers to better estimate their position by providing information useful for pilotage and anchoring . If the plummet came up clean, it meant the bottom was rock. Nautical charts provide information about the seabed materials at particular locations. Nautical charts also include depth contour lines. It
440-649: Is a length of thin rope with a plummet , generally of lead , at its end. Regardless of the actual composition of the plummet, it is still called a "lead". Leads were swung, or cast, by a leadsman, usually standing in the chains of a ship, up against the shrouds . Measuring the depth of water by lead and line dates back to ancient civilization. It continues in widespread use today in recreational boating and as an alternative to electronic echo sounding devices. Greek and Roman navigators are known to have used sounding leads, some of which have been uncovered by archaeologists. Sounding by lead and line continued throughout
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#1732852658451480-408: Is calculated based on "the moulded volume of all enclosed spaces of the ship", and is used to determine things such as a ship's manning regulations, safety rules, registration fees, and port dues. It is produced by a mathematical formula, and does not distinguish between mechanical and passenger spaces, and thus is not directly comparable to historic GRT measurements. Displacement , a measure of mass,
520-425: Is characteristic of an explosive growth in gross tonnage, which has more than doubled from the largest cruise ships of the late 1990s. This reflects the much lower relative weight of enclosed space in the comparatively light superstructure of a ship versus its heavily reinforced and machinery-laden hull space, as cruise ships have grown slab-sided vertically from their maximum beam to accommodate more passengers within
560-511: Is measuring the depth of a body of water . Data taken from soundings are used in bathymetry to make maps of the floor of a body of water, such as the seabed topography . Soundings were traditionally shown on nautical charts in fathoms and feet. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the agency responsible for bathymetric data in the United States, still uses fathoms and feet on nautical charts. In other countries,
600-498: Is not commonly used for passenger vessels. While a high displacement can indicate better sea keeping abilities, gross tonnage is promoted as the most important measure of size for passenger vessels, as the ratio of gross tonnage per passenger – the Passenger/Space Ratio – gives a sense of the spaciousness of a ship, an important consideration in cruise liners where the onboard amenities are of high importance. Historically,
640-544: Is thus sometimes possible to navigate in poor visibility by noting which contour line one is closest to. During the nineteenth century, a number of attempts were made to mechanise depth sounding. Designs ranged from complex brass machines to relatively simple pulley systems. Navies around the world, particularly the Royal Navy in Britain, were concerned about the reliability of lead and line sounding. The introduction of new machines
680-653: The Atlantic Ocean between Europe and the United States or travel even further to South America or Asia while cruise ships typically serve shorter routes with more stops along coastlines or among various islands. Both the Queen Elizabeth 2 ( QE2 ) (1969) and her successor as Cunard's flagship RMS Queen Mary 2 ( QM2 ), which entered service in 2004, are of hybrid construction. Like transatlantic ocean liners, they are fast ships and strongly built to withstand
720-546: The International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) requires passenger ships operating in international waters must either be constructed or upgraded to exclude combustible materials. It is believed some owners and operators of ships built before 1980, which are required to upgrade or retire their vessels, will be unable to conform to the regulations. Fred. Olsen Cruise Line 's Black Prince , built in 1966
760-595: The International System of Units (metres) has become the standard for measuring depth. "Sounding" derives from the Old English sund , meaning "swimming, water, sea"; it is not related to the word sound in the sense of noise or tones, but to sound , a geographical term. Traditional terms for soundings are a source for common expressions in the English language, notably "deep six" (a sounding of 6 fathoms). On
800-508: The Midland Line and Waikokopu railways. She was also carrying 461 bags of parcel-mail from London, of which 94 were rescued, as well as mail from Cristóbal and Liverpool. On her last voyage, she left Liverpool on 22 April 1922 and ran onto rocks on the stormy night of 31 May at Great Barrier, when close to her Auckland destination. The stormy waves broke her in half on 1 June and the stern section soon sank into deeper water. A distress call
840-533: The Mississippi River in the 1850s, the leadsmen also used old-fashioned words for some of the numbers; for example instead of "two" they would say "twain". Thus when the depth was two fathoms, they would call "by the mark twain!". The American writer Mark Twain , a former river pilot , likely took his pen name from this cry. The term lives on in today's world in echo sounding , the technique of using sonar to measure depth. A sounding line or lead line
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#1732852658451880-679: The medieval and early modern periods and is still commonly used today. The Bible describes lead and line sounding in Acts , whilst the Bayeux Tapestry documents the use of a sounding lead during William the Conqueror 's 1066 landing in England . Lead and line sounding operates alongside sounding poles, and/or echo sounding devices particularly when navigating in shallower waters and on rivers. At sea, in order to avoid repeatedly hauling in and measuring
920-542: The merchant marine , passenger ships have also been used as troopships and often are commissioned as naval ships when used as for that purpose. Passenger Ship Types: Passenger ships include ferries , which are vessels for day to day or overnight short-sea trips moving passengers and vehicles (whether road or rail); ocean liners , which typically are passenger or passenger-cargo vessels transporting passengers and often cargo on longer line voyages; and cruise ships , which often transport passengers on round-trips, in which
960-488: The Seas in October 2009. Because of changes in historic measurement systems, it is difficult to make meaningful and accurate comparisons of ship sizes. Historically, gross register tonnage (GRT) was a measure of the internal volume of certain enclosed areas of a ship divided into "tons" equivalent to 100 cubic feet (2.8 m ) of space. Gross tonnage (GT) is a comparatively new measure, adopted in 1982 to replace GRT. It
1000-472: The crew of the ship to operate electrically powered mechanisms. Lack of an adequate backup system to propel the ship can, in rough seas, render it dead in the water and result in loss of the ship. The 2006 Revised Passenger Ship Safety Standards address these issues, and others, requiring that ships ordered after July, 2010 conform to safe return to port regulations; however, as of 2013 many ships remain in service which lack this capacity. After October 1, 2010,
1040-409: The depth as he read it off the line. If the depth was at a mark he would call "by the mark" followed by the number, while if it was between two marks, he would call "by the deep" followed by the estimated number; thus "by the mark five", since there is a five-fathom mark, but "by the deep six", since there is no six-fathom mark. Fractions would be called out by preceding the number with the phrases "and
1080-401: The later nineteenth century, new machines were introduced to measure much greater depths of water. The most widely adopted deep-sea sounding machine in the nineteenth century was Kelvin's sounding machine , designed by William Thomson (Lord Kelvin) and patented in 1876. This operated on the same principle as lead and line sounding. In this case, the line consisted of a drum of piano wire whilst
1120-485: The lead was of a much greater weight. Later versions of Kelvin's machine also featured a motorised drum in order to facilitate the winding and unwinding of the line. These devices also featured a dial which recorded the length of line let out. Both lead-and-line technology and sounding machines were used during the twentieth century, but by the twenty-first, echo sounding has increasingly displaced both of those methods. A sounding line can still be found on many vessels as
1160-412: The nineteenth century. The Royal Navy also purchased a number of Peter Burt's buoy and nipper device. This machine was quite different from Massey's. It consisted of an inflatable canvas bag (the buoy ) and a spring-loaded wooden pulley block (the nipper). Again, the device was designed to operate alongside a lead and line. In this case, the buoy would be pulled behind the ship and the line threaded through
1200-417: The pulley. The lead could then be released. The buoy ensured that the lead fell perpendicular to the sea floor even when the ship was moving. The spring-loaded pulley would then catch the rope when the lead hit the sea bed, ensuring an accurate reading of the depth. Both Massey and Burt's machines were designed to operate in relatively shallow waters (up to 150 fathoms). With the growth of seabed telegraphy in
1240-618: The rigors of the North Atlantic in line voyage service, but both ships are also designed to operate as cruise ships, with the amenities expected in that trade. QM2 was superseded by the Freedom of the Seas of the Royal Caribbean line as the largest passenger ship ever built; however, QM2 still hold the record for the largest ocean liner. The Freedom of the Seas was superseded by the Oasis of
SS Wiltshire - Misplaced Pages Continue
1280-535: The sea floor, the rotor would lock. Massey's sounding machine could then be hauled in and the depth could be read off the dials in fathoms. By 1811, the Royal Navy had purchased 1,750 of these devices: one for every ship in commission during the Napoleonic Wars . The Board of Longitude was instrumental in convincing the Royal Navy to adopt Massey's machine. Massey's was not the only sounding machine adopted during
1320-413: The surface. The inquiry into the wreck found that the captain made a grave error of judgement in not slowing enough, when poor visibility obscured Cuvier lighthouse and when a lead line measurement showed the ship was in shallower water than expected. He was charged the costs of the inquiry, but his certificate was returned to him. Passenger ship While typically passenger ships are part of
1360-508: The trip itself and the attractions of the ship and ports visited are the principal draw. There are several main types: Although some ships have characteristics of both types, the design priorities of the two forms are different: ocean liners value speed and traditional luxury while cruise ships value amenities (swimming pools, theaters, ball rooms, casinos, sports facilities, etc.) rather than speed. These priorities produce different designs. In addition, ocean liners typically were built to cross
1400-431: The wet line by stretching it out with one's arms, it is common practice to tie marks at intervals along the line. These marks are made of leather , calico , serge and other materials, and so shaped and attached that it is possible to "read" them by eye during the day or by feel at night. Traditionally the marks were at every second or third fathom: at 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 13, 15, 17, and 20 fathoms. The "leadsman" called out
1440-564: Was one such ship, but was reported to be headed for inter-island service in Venezuelan waters. The International Ice Patrol was formed in 1914 after the sinking of the Titanic to address the long-outstanding issue of iceberg collision. Passengers and their luggage at sea are covered by the Athens Convention . Depth sounding Depth sounding , often simply called sounding ,
1480-507: Was radioed, but the storm forced other ships to keep their distance. A Union collier, Katoa , landed its chief officer, purser, third engineer and two seamen at Tryphena, and they made their way over rough tracks to the Bay. Several attempts were made to float a line ashore from the Wiltshire . One of Katoa 's crew grabbed it from between the waves, a brave act, for which he was later presented with
1520-611: Was requisitioned as Australian Expeditionary Force transport A18, carrying 36 officers, 720 troops and 505 horses. She was in the first convoy which assembled in King George's Sound in October 1914, taking Australian and New Zealand forces to Europe. Then, until 5 September 1919, she was managed by the Liner Requisition Scheme . She finished her war service by bringing troops back from Egypt to Wellington in January 1919. Wiltshire
1560-412: Was understood as a way to introduce standardised practices for sounding in a period in which naval discipline was of great concern. One of the most widely adopted sounding machines was developed in 1802 by Edward Massey, a clockmaker from Staffordshire . The machine was designed to be fixed to a sounding lead and line. It featured a rotor which turned a dial as the lead sank to the sea floor. On striking
1600-470: Was wrecked in Rosalie Bay, Great Barrier Island , about 3 km (1.9 mi) from the southernmost point at Cape Barrier, on 31 May 1922. About 10,000 tons of cargo was aboard, including household goods, metals, clothing, building materials, motor cars, whisky, tobacco, equipment for Pukekohe power station and two NZR A class locomotives. The need to replace the lost equipment delayed the work of building
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