FIREY END - by William H Miller

The World Ocean & Cruise
Liner Society
Presents

FIERY END
By William H. Miller

Despite the infirmities of old age, such as decreasing economic efficiency that is often complicated by mechanical woes, shipowners sometimes see hope - and sometimes lots of it -in secondhand cruiseships. Greek shipowners, in particular, have had a long track record in this area. Often, they can work wonders with older ships. A most recent example is the case of the newly formed Fiesta Cruise Lines. They had high hopes for their 9,900-ton, 35-year-old FIESTA. She had been brought over to Greece after being laid-up in Florida and, once moored in Perama Bay near Piraeus, her resurrection began. She was to emerge as yet another "new" cruiseship, taking travelers around the Eastern Mediterranean in summers and in Caribbean waters in wintertime. But it all went astray when, on October 24, 1991, the 487-foot-long ship caught fire, burned out and then, overloaded with firefighters' water, capsized. Repairs are doubtful.

Clearly unknown to the North American cruise industry as the FIESTA, the ship is perhaps best remembered as Bermuda Star Line's VERACRUZ. Small by recent standards and even somewhat out-of-step among the current generation of high-tech mega-liners, the "little" VERACRUZ was best known for her friendly ambience and her good travel value. She also had a rather interesting background.

Built at Hamburg in 1957, she was part of a special reparations pact between what was then West Germany and the state of Israel. Four passenger ships were included in the arrangements: the sisters ISRAEL (now scrapped) and ZION (today Dolphin Cruises' DOLPHIN), and the JERUSALEM (sunk in the Pacific in 1979) and THEODOR HERZL. The first brand new Israeli passenger ships, it was the HERZL that later became the VERACRUZ. She and her twin sister, the JERUSALEM, were designed purposely for the then booming Mediterranean trades, carrying immigrants and budget tourists mostly to and from Haifa. They carried some 560 all-tourist class passengers on regular runs out of Marseilles, Naples and Venice. In winter, they often went cruising. Their owners, the Zim Lines, had the JERUSALEM on the New York-Caribbean run for several winter seasons while the THEODOR HERZL had at least one season to the Mexican Riviera. The HERZL, named in honor of the founder of the Zionist movement, also had a celebratory maiden voyage to New York and, in later years, made several immigrant crossings to South America, to Rio, Montevideo and Buenos Aires.

The gradual, but later complete decline of migration by sea and then this being complicated by expensive, almost excessive Israeli maritime labor costs prematurely ended the Zim Lines' careers of both ships. The JERUSALEM went on to become the Florida-based cruiseship MIAMI and then the NEW BAHAMA STAR. The HERZL, withdrawn in 1970, was to become the CARNIVALE for the Arison Group, who would soon found the mighty Carnival Cruise Lines. In fact, nothing came to pass and she did not sail again until as late as 1975, when she was recommissioned for the Miami-Nassau-Freeport run as the FREEPORT for Bahama Cruise Lines. She now flew the Panamanian colors and was so altered that her capacity increased to as much as 960. While her owners eventually changed their name to Bermuda Star Line, she went through a series of official name changes as well - first to VERACRUZ I, then to VERACRUZ PRIMERO and finally to VERACRUZ. But now, after a varied cruising career that included Alaska, the Caribbean, Mexico and Eastern Canada-New England sailings, her days seem to be over. She had met with a fiery end.

The End

Reprinted from a past issue ofOcean & Cruise News.
Subscribe today and enjoy 12 monthly issues packed with facinating articles on ships, their companies and their itineraries past & present.

- Join Today -