Wednesday April 12, 2023
Another day at sea, having now travelled 26,339 nm since we left Southampton and some more interesting lectures. First it was Dr. Stephen Payne OBE, the designer of Queen Mary 2 (which was to be called the Mauritania 3), speaking about the great and fastest transatlantic ships of the Cunard fleet – The Lusitania (1906) and the Mauritania (1907). They were built to counter the German ships that were the fastest and held the “Blue Riband” for transatlantic speed. These two ships exceeded the speed and were constantly viewing for fastest until the Lusitania which had been commissioned by the government as troop ships during WW1 was sunk off the coast of Ireland, by a German U-Boat. The Mauritania, served in many capacities as well and went on to have a fantastic 20 years of service. One of the most striking statistic he mentioned was that to keep the 27.8 Knot or higher speed, it required 1,000 tons of coal to be shoveled into the boilers a day! Each time the ship was in port, a large amount of coal was on-boarded, causing the coal dust to permeate the ship necessitating a week of cleaning after the coal delivery. This eventually gave way to the use of oil.
The second lecture was Diane Janes, a criminologist speaking of the famous pathologist – Sir Bernard Spilsbury, who was perhaps the best known pathologist of the time. He sometimes is even called “The Father of Pathology”. However, it appears that he took lots of short cuts and indeed many of the cases that relied on his testimony as being the most important and well respected pathologist, put many an innocent person in jail. Was he a true expert to be revered? or was he a sinner that ruined many people’s lives unjustly? She went over the pros and cons allowing the audience to decide for themselves.
After lunch we caught up on paperwork and after dinner enjoyed the South African Comedian, who now lives in the UK – Mark Palmer. An amusing chap which we enjoyed.
Roger & Anne Travels 