Nova Scotia’s worst shipwreck sets the tone for Halifax Harbour this week

This week gets off to an unusually quiet start in the harbour. But that’s a fitting way to honour the weekend’s anniversary of a massive shipwreck in the North Atlantic. The doomed vessel was a proud steamship of the White Star Line, sailing from England to New York, and when it went down taking hundreds of lives with it, news spread around the world about the worst maritime disaster of the century. But it wasn’t the Titanic—that sinking’s anniversary is coming up on April 15. Instead it was the Atlantic, which happened 150 years ago on April 1, within sight of Lower Prospect.

The sesquicentennial of the SS Atlantic’s sinking wasn’t well marked by Halifax media, The Coast included. We only realized the occasion thanks to the Wisconsin State Journal, which was doing one of those 150-years-ago-in-the-newspaper stories, and the Atlantic tragedy was on the front page on April 2, 1873. Here’s the opening paragraph of the story the Wisconsin paper published back then: “The telegraph brings us scant particulars of one of the most awful shipwrecks on record, involving the loss of over 500 lives, within sight of land, in consequence of what appears to have been inexcusable carelessness or ignorance.”

There is a local group—the SS Atlantic Heritage Park Society—that maintains both a memorial in Terence Bay and website about the disaster. The site explains how the ship’s captain, James Williams, decided to divert to Halifax for refueling when the Atlantic was running low on coal en route to New York.

Having never been to Halifax, Williams was unaware of the strong currents of the Western Atlantic caused by the 50 foot tides of the Bay of Fundy. He believed the ship to be near Halifax when it was in fact nearly 20 kilometres to the west, near the fishing community of Lower Prospect. At 3:15 A.M. on the 1st of April, 1873, while the captain slept, the Atlantic smashed at full speed into the rocky shores and was wrecked, resulting in the deaths of around 550 people (the exact number has never been established) including all the women and all the children but one.

Had it not been for the heroism and bravery of the seaside community, that number would have surely been much larger. The fishermen of Lower Prospect rallied soon after the ship struck a small island. They launched their boats to rescue survivors clinging to life on the wreck of the crippled ship. Meanwhile, the residents of the local communities struggled to care for those that managed to make it to shore.

The Globe and Mail picks up the story in a review of SS Atlantic: The White Star Line’s First Disaster at Sea. The book’s writers, Bob Chaulk and the late Greg Cochkanoff, point out that the “White Star Line did its best to forget the disaster, striking the name SS Atlantic from all its public records. Not that there was much resistance to this.” After all, shipping disasters were pretty common in 1873, and unlike the Titanic 39 years later, the Atlantic never made the hubris-defining claim to be unsinkable. “The Atlantic sinking was so far from the public’s mind that, when the Titanic sank, no one in the media linked it to the White Star Line’s first disaster at sea.”

If you’d like to learn more about the Atlantic’s history, Thomas Lynskey made a well-received 65-minute documentary film. It’s embedded at the bottom of this story for easy access, but first let’s move on to this week’s harbour visitors.

Monday

No ships arrived at the Port of Halifax today, and the Atlantic is definitely to blame. But is that the memory of the steamship Atlantic, or routine travel delays on the Atlantic Ocean? You’ll have to decide.

Tuesday

The 294-metre NYK Rumina container ship arrived at the Fairview Cove Terminal at 6:59am, a few days behind schedule from Caucedo, Dominican Republic. It’s heading onward to Southampton, UK.

The Tropic Hope container ship docked at the South End Container Terminal at 7am, roughly a week behind schedule from Philipsburg, Sint Maarten. The Hope was joined 54 minutes later by the Vivienne Sheri D container ship, inbound from Reykjavik, Iceland. The 140-metre ship—owned by Ontario-based Doornekamp Lines and chartered by Icelandic shipping giant Eimskip—was expected to arrive at 8am according to the Port of Halifax’s Vessel Forecast Summary, so it’s one of the rare early arrivals to Halifax Harbour this week. It left for Portland, Maine this afternoon.

Finally, the Oceanex Sanderling ro-ro/container ship is just under the wire to be counted as a Tuesday arrival, making its weekly stop at the South End Container Terminal before midnight at 11:15pm. Inbound from St. John’s, Newfoundland, the Sanderling returns to The Rock after its Halifax leg.

Wednesday

The BBC Challenger general cargo ship arrived at 3am from Montreal. Not so long ago the 145-metre vessel was in the southern Pacific Ocean, crossing through the Panama Canal at the start of March. That makes for a pretty abrupt change in weather conditions, but of any ship, this one should be up for the challenge.

The afternoon got busy on the water, starting with the ZIM Vancouver container ship’s docking in Halifax, a week behind schedule from Valencia, Spain. Next to arrive was the Wallenius Wilhelmsen-operated Theben ro-ro/vehicle carrier, which tied up at the Eastern Passage Autoport. Built in 2016, it can transport up to 8,000 cars.

Last but not least, remember the Brooklyn Bridge? After 10 days of delays, it finally tied up at the Fairview Cove Terminal around 6pm. The 266-metre container ship was last in port in New York City, appropriately enough, and from Halifax is destined for Le Havre, France.

Thursday

Nolhan Ava ro-ro/cargo carrier pulled into the Fairview Cove Terminal around 8am, roughly 1.5 days behind schedule.

Scheduled to dock at 1:30pm, the Grand Dahlia ro-ro/vehicle carrier is the second arrival of the day. It’s inbound from Southampton, UK. Operated by NYK Line, the Dahlia was built in Japan in 2009 and can carry upwards of 6,400 cars.

Running three days late is the Mol Courage container ship, expected at the South End Container Terminal by 6pm as it wraps a three-week sailing from Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Friday

It’s the Good Friday statutory holiday in Canada, but there’s no day off on the water. The Atlantic Sky ro-ro/container ship is slated to arrive at the Fairview Cove Terminal at 8am. It’s a couple days late inbound from Norfolk, Virginia before it crosses the pond to Liverpool, UK.

NYK Delphinus container ship is expected to arrive at Fairview Cove Terminal at 4pm, three days behind schedule on its trip from Antwerp, Belgium.

Saturday

In British Columbia there’s the Sea to Sky Highway, a scenic drive linking the port city of Vancouver with the ski town of Whistler. This week in Halifax, we’re going from Sky to Sea—yesterday it was the Atlantic Sky scheduled to arrive, today it’s the Atlantic Sea. The container ship is slated to dock at Fairview Cove Terminal at 8am, five days behind schedule.

Also on the Port of Halifax arrivals forecast, the ZIM Luanda container ship is due at the South End Container Terminal at 8am. That’s amost five days behind schedule after a European tour that included stops in Greece, Italy and, most recently, Valencia, Spain.

The CMA CGM Corte Real container ship—a big boat at 366 metres long—scheduled to arrive at South End Container Terminal at 11am, nearly two days late on the trip from Tanger Med, Morocco. Less than half the length of the Corte Real, container ship AS Felicia is supposed to arrive at South End Container Terminal at noon, a week behind.

Closing out a busy Saturday, the MSC Santa Maria container ship is slated to arrive at South End Container Terminal at 8pm, 12.5 days behind schedule from Sines, Portugal.

Sunday

The week ends with a real split shift of a day. Starting early, Vistula Maersk container ship is on the schedule to arrive at South End Container Terminal at 6am. After that, things are expected to be quiet until after dark, with the container ship Tropic Lissette container ship due at South End Container Terminal at 8pm. The Tropic Lissette is coming off a two-week tropical run with stops in Freeport, Bahamas; Palm Beach, Florida; San Juan, Puerto Rico; Saint Thomas, US Virgin Islands and, last before heading north, Philipsburg, Sint Maarten. It’s six days behind schedule, but that’s really nothing—we’d stay in the south until June if we could.

And now, here’s Thomas Lynskey’s documentary about the worst maritime disaster in Nova Scotia history, The Wreck of the SS Atlantic.