Dear all,

According to scrap reports this morning, The Topaz has been sold to
Indian breakers for a few dollars short of $12 million. Poor ship - she
looked quite magnificent at anchor off Singapore yesterday.

Jonathan

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So much for the last minute charter!!!!

[ 06-02-2008: Message edited by: Redlinekid2 ]

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Originally posted by Midshipcentury:
Too bad. I guess that price was too good for Katsoufis to turn down. Steel prices must be through the roof. In 2001, MARIANNA VI (ex AUREOL) went for less than half a million (admittedly, she was half the size of THE TOPAZ) but at today's rate, she would have gone for six million.

Peter Knego

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I agree with you, Peter. It's so unfortunate that the ship could not get another charter. I guess that's because of the soaring fuel prices and the soaring scrap metal prices did her in. It's also a shame that the Glaslow consortium was not able to sign a letter of intent to buy the ship before it was too late. I asked Alex of the following site about those developments:

http://www.oceanlinermuseum.co.uk/savetheclassiclinerscampaign.html

Up to now, I have not heard a word from them about those ideas. It would have been nice to have seen that ship returned to Scotland. But I guess that it was not meant to be. So another ship fall along the lines of the SS Norway. A pity.

[ 06-02-2008: Message edited by: Redlinekid2 ]

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Originally posted by Redlinekid2:

So another ship fall along the lines of the SS Norway. A pity.
[ 06-02-2008: Message edited by: Redlinekid2 ]

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More like the NORWAY and TOPAZ fall along the lines of literally thousands of other passenger ships. It has ever been this way with ships.

Onno

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Originally posted by Redlinekid2:
It's sad that the ship couldn't find another charter. But I guess that's the way it is. Soon the ship will go down in history like the SS Norway and the Canberra. Two of the greatest ships of all time beached and scrapped with the world watching picture by picture. I hope that someone can at least document the breakup of the ship. I wonder what sort of secrets the ship may hold durring this process?

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The world no only we liner buffs. The rest of the world don't care.
That said Bye bye old girl we will remember you.

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Originally posted by lasuvidaboy:
Even though I was never a fan of her modified profile (the Empress of Canada was the real beauty of the postwar CP line-up) it is sad to see the old girl go. What is all the more amazing is she outlasted her contemporaries by 20-30 years! She has made her builders and original designers proud

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I agree that she lasted longer than her builders had expected. As for EC's modified profile, she was much better than the S.S. Emerald (1958) - former S.S. Santa Rosa and M.S. Athena (1948) - former M.S. Stockholm, which are beyond horrible alterations. At least the EC had a long and productive life. All of her 1950's contemporaries, except for the SS United States, Queen Mary, and SS Rotterdam V, are gone.

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Originally posted by nathan:
I've been dreading this for many years. She was the first ship that I sailed on. I think I have more vivid memories of that cruise than any other.

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Depending on who has bought The Topaz will depend if anything from her is saved and offered for sale if she is scrapped.

Should she have been sold a scrapyard in some where like China, then you could have the same happen as when ss Oriana was scrapped, after being partly flooded for nearly a year.

Most of the work was done behind closed doors and nothing is known to have been saved from the ship.

There is some pictures in circulation of the top superstructure being removed but none of the hull being cut up.

In the P&O museum on board, at Dalain in China, was one of my blue officers uniforms which was still there from when the ship was first berthed at Beppu Bay in Japan as a tourist attraction.

I doubt if it would now fit me if it surfaced !