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CAREER The ''Empress of Britain'' was launched on June 11th , 1930 , started sea trials on April 13th , 1931 , and started her maiden voyage on May 27th , 1931 . {Link without Title} She was designed for two proposes: to entice passengers to sail from England to Quebec instead of the more popular Southampton to New York route, and to serve as a luxury Cruise Ship during the winter. For the latter role her size was kept small enough to use the Panama and Suez Canal s, though at 760.6 feet (231.84 m) and 42,348 gross tons, she was still impressively large. For cruising two of her engines where shut down, and two of her propellers were removed, since speed was not important on a cruise. With all four engines, her speed was 24 knots, making her the fastest ship sailing from England to Canada. Upon Britain's entry into World War II, the ''Empress of Britain'' was requisitioned for use as a troop transport. She ended up transporting troops between England and Suez , traveling around the Cape Of Good Hope to make the trip. SINKING At around 9:20 AM on October 26 , 1940 , while traveling along the west coast of Ireland , the ''Empress of Britain'' was spotted by a German Focke-Wulf C 200 Condor long-range Bomber , commanded by Oberleutnant Bernhard Jope. Jope’s bomber strafed the Empress 3 times and hit her twice with 250 kg Bomb s. The bombs started a raging fire that could not be contained, and began to over take the whole ship. By 9:50 AM, Captain Sapworth gave the order to abandon ship. The fire was concentrated in the midsection of the ship, causing the passengers to head for the bow and stern and hampering launching of the Lifeboat s. Later that afternoon, the Destroyer s ''Echo'' and ''Empress'' arrived. By then, the ship had been evacuated. The fire had left the ship severely damaged and unable to move under her own power, but she was not sinking. At 9:30 AM on , one of which hit. The ''Empress of Britain'' sank in nine minutes. GOLD AND SALVAGE It was suspected that the ''Empress of Britain'' had been carrying Gold when she sank. At the time, Great Britain was trying to ship gold to North America to improve its credit. South Africa was a major gold producer, and the ''Empress'' had stopped in Cape Town , South Africa before heading to England. Most of the gold went from Cape Town to Sydney , Australia , and then to America, but there were not enough suitable ships to move that gold from Australia to America, and gold was getting stuck in Australia. Therefore, it was theorized that the ''Empress'' may have been used to take gold from South Africa to England were it could them be moved to America. On January 8 , 1949 , the ''Daily Mail'' published a story about a Salvage attempt that was going to be made that summer. There were no follow-ups, and the story contained several errors. In 1985 , a potential salvager got a letter From the Department of Transport Shipping Policy Unit saying that there was gold on board, but that it had been recovered. In 1995 , a groups of salvagers found the ''Empress of Britain'' lying upside-down in 500 feet of water. Using Saturation Diving , they entered the wreck and found that the fire had destroyed most of the decks, leaving a largely empty shell rising from the sea floor. The ship’s bullion room, however, was still intact. Inside was a skeleton, but no gold. REFERENCES
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