Limping to Greatness: The Story of SS Imperator



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Sources:
The Only Way to Cross by John Maxtone-Graham
The Liner by Philip Dawson
https://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/05/arts/05iht-ballin.1.6503104.html
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44135

Music and Select Stock Footage:
Epidemic Sound: https://www.epidemicsound.com/referral/hdulva
Artlist: https://artlist.io/

Chapters:
00:00 Chapter 1: Albert Ballin
5:29 Chapter 2: Size Matters?
10:39 Chapter 3: Limperator
17:49 Chapter 4: Death of a Dream
22:25 Chapter 5: Berengaria or The Ship Formerly Known as Imperator

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25 thoughts on “Limping to Greatness: The Story of SS Imperator”

  1. 0:40: 🚢 Albert Ballin revolutionized the cruise industry through innovative thinking and launching the first purpose-built cruise ship.
    5:37: 🔒 Protect your privacy and remove personal information from data brokers with Incogni.
    7:49: 🚢 The Imperator ship was fitted with additional safety measures after the Titanic disaster and had space for 83 lifeboats.
    11:39: 🚢 The Imperator, the largest passenger ship in the world, had a delayed maiden voyage due to a fire and was blamed on bad weather and inadequate docking facilities.
    15:53: ! The Normandie liner experienced stability issues throughout its career despite alterations made to improve its center of gravity and reduce weight.
    20:22: 🚢 The Imperator ship underwent a badly needed overhaul and refurbishment before starting service with Cunard Line in 1920.
    24:36: 🚢 The Berengaria ship faced a bomb threat, but it turned out to be a hoax.
    Recapped using TammyAI

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  2. Wonderful videos, such as this, ram home again how tragic it is that ocean travel is now only on floating apartment blocks (in an unholy marriage with the Oscar ceremony). Thanks very much for reminding us of what was once graceful, special and elegant.

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  3. Very interesting and well-presented! That's quite a poignant photo at the end of the three 'sisters' together in their different company liveries. In my opinion, Majestic was the pick of the bunch aesthetically; Berengaria and (to a lesser degree Leviathan), while certainly grand, have a lugubrious look to them.

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  4. The tendency to heel over and stay there that Imperator showed on her sea trials is probably actually a loll. This is a result of her being very slightly unstable in the upright condition, but becoming stable as she heels over a little and immerses more of her hull. It’s a very bad sign, because ships like that will require much less energy to capsize than a ship that is properly stable. If they hadn’t modified her after her first season, the severe storm in her second season probably would have capsized and sunk her.

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  5. That is not a case of "Sadly they were never replaced" on that eagles wings. It was a thank god nature tore off that excrement from the bow. Who ever came up with that surely was working nights to embarrass the German liner – oh and 2000 tons of concrete is a mistake on the scale of the sinking on launching. One US Heavy cruiser (10,000 tons standard) took 200 tons of concrete to counter all the extra aa guns and the designers were humiliated.

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  6. Interesting footnote: One of her funnels, her wheel and other assorted fittings adorned a 2000 seat theatre called the Berengaria built in the shape of a ship at the Middleton Tower Holiday Camp in the UK and survived until it was demolished in the 2000s.

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  7. Ballin sure was ballin' at the height of his career, that's for sure. Disregarding whoever was on the right side of history for a minute, this is why we can't have nice things, because dumb, stupid people provoke and then cause an outbreak of war between basically every major superpower in the world. Imagine if there was no WW1, or WW2, and what it would've been like if this trio of trios, the Three Kings as I like to call them, got to sail as intended under their native flags? Rather than having stunted potential from being sold off to foreign lines who had no clue how to operate them as prizes of war, it is clear to me that they probably would've been the champions of the Atlantic. What a shame, but an epic job well done once again. This is the best retelling of Imperator's story that I have ever seen.

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