SS Northern Star (1961)

Northern Star
History
Name	Northern Star
Owner	Shaw, Savill & Albion Line
Port of registry	Southampton, UK
Route	Southampton-Las Palmas-Cape Town-Durban-Fremantle-Melbourne-Sydney-Wellington-Auckland-Raratonga-Tahiti-Acapulco-Panama-Curacao-Trinidad-Barbados-Lisbon-Southampton
Builder	Vickers-Armstrongs, Walker, Newcastle-on-Tyne, England
Yard number	175
Launched	June 27th 1961
Completed	June 26th 1962
In service	July 10th 1962
Out of service	1975
Fate	Scrapped
General characteristics
Type	Ocean liner
Tonnage	24,731 GRT (1968, 23,983 GRT)
Length	650 ft (200 m)
Beam	83 ft (25 m)
Installed power	22,000shp
Propulsion	Geared turbines, twin screw
Speed	22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph)
Capacity	1,437 tourist class

SS Northern Star was an ocean liner built in 1962 for the United Kingdom-based Shaw, Savill & Albion Line's tourist class round the world service via South Africa and Australia. She was essentially an enlarged version of the SS Southern Cross, built seven years earlier. Northern Star sailed out via the Cape and home via Panama, while her fleet mate sailed out via Panama and home via the Cape. From the early 1970s she spent most of her time cruising, but was continually beset with mechanical problems due to inadequate maintenance. With the great increase in oil prices in 1973/4 she became uneconomic and would have required an expensive and time-consuming refit to make up for the deferred maintenance and so was withdrawn from service at the end of her 1975 summer cruise programme. In spite of being only twelve years old her poor mechanical condition made her unattractive to other operators and she was sold for scrapping. On December 11, 1975 she arrived at Kaohsiung to be broken up by Li Chong Steel and Iron Works

Ship on the slipway prior to launching