1914 sinking of the RMS Empress of Ireland

Hours out of Quebec City and bound for Liverpool, the liner sighted the lights of a Norwegian collier a few miles off on the St Lawrence in the pre dawn of 29 May 1914. At 1:55 am her master saw the collier appear out of the fog heading straight for him, and minutes later it struck the liner's starboard side between the two funnels, where her large compartments left her vulnerable. Her hull reinforced against ice, the collier opened a hole that could not be contained, and the liner keeled over fourteen minutes after being struck. The formal inquiry recorded the loss as a collision between the two ships.

Date
1914-05-29
Deaths (Wikipedia list, low end where it gives a range)
1012
What the pin marks
Where she sank in the Saint Lawrence River, at the wreck as the cited page positions it. The wreck was declared a site of historical and archaeological importance in 1999 and is protected under Quebec's Cultural Property Act.
Where the position is published
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Empress_of_Ireland

Category: Disasters & Incidents

Tags: ocean liner, collision, fog, st lawrence, 1914

Coordinates: 48.625, -68.40833

Part of Peacetime shipwrecks that killed 500 or more people since 1900

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