It's early in the morning September 1918 the twilight of the first world war Olympic a troop
ship is making its way from Southampton all is calm but beneath the waves a predator lurks
it's a German submarine a u-boat and its commander has Olympic perfectly in his sights
he waits patiently for his shot
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two torpedoes have been fired they roar through the water at great speed
each carries 195 kilogram warhead just three years earlier the rms Lusitania was torpedoed and sunk
in very similar circumstances now the torpedoes bear down on Olympic impact is a certainty
this attack on Olympic actually happened it was in the final stages of the first world war
and it's believed that the submarine u-53 fired the offending torpedo now one of them missed but
one of them hit dead centre but didn't detonate if Olympic had sunk that morning it would have
been the end of the Olympic class as a whole because titanic and Britannic were gone and it
would have been a real shame because the 1920s were some of the best years of Olympic’s career
for almost a year following the first world war Olympic continued to serve as a troop ship
repatriating British and Canadian soldiers she had been hastily repainted in her peacetime colours
perhaps a little too hastily because in patches the black paint of the hull wore
off and she could see her striking camouflage pattern beneath a Olympics’ problems were
not just cosmetic however the ship had been driven hard for four years of war
and her plumbing electrical and engineering systems all needed care and overhaul if she
was to re-enter the passenger service a tired Olympic was finally retired from admiralty service
and made it back to her builders Harland and Wolf in Belfast northern Ireland in august 1919.
the shipper transported some 200 000 people safely over 36 trooping voyages surviving submarine
attacks and even having managed to sink one in action four years earlier in 1916 her larger and
newer sister ship Britannic had struck a mine off Greece while serving as a hospital ship
and sank now it was up to Olympic to shoulder the burden of the ever popular Southampton to new York
service the liner was fatigued and her refit would be extensive the biggest change made to Olympic
during this time was to her machinery Olympic had originally been built as a coal-burning ship
this had been the primary means of feeding ship spoilers for decades but as early as 1912 thought
had been given to converting Olympic to burn oil fuel instead this had a number of advantages
first it meant that the large number of hands required to endlessly shovel coal into the
furnaces would no longer be needed in fact the engineering complement was reduced from 350
to just 60 men it also changed the refuelling process bunkering coal took days and was a
dirty grimy business coating the ship's hull in thick coal dust and soot instead refuelling could
now be complete in just five or six hours as liquid oil was pumped into the bunkers
there was a bit of good foresight here too in my what happened to Olympic after titanic sank video
we analysed the additional inner skin which had been added and subdivided into small cellular
watertight compartments these could now be used to store additional liquid fuel oil giving Olympic
and impressive capacity in range the conversion to oil drove another small external change
Olympic titanic and Britannic had all originally been fitted with small triangular
coaling outriggers with their wires slung out along the promenade deck these have been used
to act sort of like cranes slinging buckets of coal into the ship's sides during refuelling
they weren't needed anymore so they were deleted giving Olympic side a nice clean look additional
safety measures were introduced too previously watertight doors and Olympic spoiler rooms had
to be closed manually a process which could take up to two minutes after her refit the system was
entirely automated from the bridge powered by electricity and took less than 20 seconds
her ventilation systems were improved and she received a whole new lifeboat plan
all in all she could now carry 50 lifeboats many designed to nest inside another two of
these boats were 28 foot long motorboats which even carried their own wireless set
this gave Olympics lifeboats a capacity for almost three and a half thousand people
inside Olympics’ full pre-war glory was restored all of the wood panelling and
decoration that had been removed during the war was restored and anything that
was damaged was replaced with panels which had been built but never fitted to the Britannic
this all took 10 months but finally in 1920 the shining all-new rms Olympic proudly steamed into
Belfast lough and the open ocean to the casual observer from the outside she would have looked
about the same as she did when she first left her shipbuilders in 1911. but now instead of
thick coal smoke pouring out of her funnels there was just the slightest wisp of oil smoke instead
Olympic was ready to face the 1920s and a whole new era
now it would be a little bit remiss of me not to mention this small event that occurred we all know
Olympic had a little penchant for the dramatic and when she was steaming from Belfast to Southampton
that first time powered by oil a huge fire broke out caused by faulty valves the faulty valves
allowed extra fuel oil to escape which then caught a light in one of the boiler rooms it was under
control in 15 minutes thanks largely to a fire extinguishing system installed exactly for this
reason but it's just one more interesting event in Olympics colourful career anyway Olympic returned
to service and was built by the white star line as the largest oil burning passenger ship afloat
her first post-war transatlantic voyage was billed as a second maiden voyage but by 1920 hers was a
household name and the ship had become a bit of a legend she was booked to the brim and carried
2249 passengers in absolute style and comfort the crossing was a success and it set the scene for
the early 1920s she steamed into new York harbor having averaged 21 knots across the Atlantic
on that voyage she'd carried the new York symphony orchestra who were returning after a successful
tour of Europe they played on deck as reception boats circled the line-up all seemed well except
that typhus had recently broken out in Serbia and Olympic on that voyage was carrying 180 people
from there in third class the ship had to be quarantined for five days to the annoyance of many
regardless the crossing had been a great success and Olympic was back in the spotlight
as one of the most prestigious ocean liners on the transatlantic run with Britannic having been lost
white star's transatlantic service was now run by a mismatched pair of liners the old rms Adriatic
of 1906 one of white star's so-called big four originally intended to sail from Liverpool to new
York now served alongside Olympic which was 21 000 gross registered tons bigger and five knots faster
regardless in 1920 the odd couple managed 37 Atlantic crossings many of them booked
out in a post-war boom and they carried 60 000 people between them Olympic became a favourite
for the rich and famous carrying the likes of Charlie Chaplin Douglas Fairbanks Mary Pickford
and Percy Rockefeller her passenger lists include millionaires politicians generals
judges socialites stars and she earned herself the nickname of the film star liner in the press
the years 1920 to 1921 were good years for Olympic as the post-war merchant shipping world
still reeled and plans were yet to be finalized for running mates and rivals
but then in 1922 things were to change with the introduction of a new generation of super lighter
that would steal some of Olympic spotlight
Cunard had lost Lusitania in 1915. but the post-war boom had begun to serve them well too
Aquitania proved to be a trans-Atlantic champion carrying 60 000 passengers in 1921
to Olympics 37 000. in 1922 Bertram Hayes Olympics master through the final years of world war one
and through 1920 and 1921 was transferred to a newer larger ship she had been built in Germany
for Hamburg America line as the Bismarck but was not finished before the war broke out
instead she was awarded to Britain as a war reparation in view of the loss of Britannic
and was then bought by White Star Line she was certainly impressive this superliner was over 950
feet long and 56 000 gross registered tons Olympic was no longer the largest liner in the white star
fleet nor the flagship that honour went to this new behemoth liner which had been renamed majestic
finally three large ocean liners were servicing white star lines
Southampton to new York service but it was an odd line-up to say the least
fairly early on white star line had recognized that more than two ocean liners of equivalent
size would be needed to operate a regular and reliable transatlantic service like clockwork
with three ships one could be departing Southampton for new York another departing
new York for Southampton and a third still could already be mid-ocean in either direction
the company's dream envisaged this service being maintained by
Olympic titanic and Britannic but that dream had died with titanic and Britannic’s loss
the company would have to make do with what it had at hand now the busy transatlantic service
would be operated by majestic Olympic and the smaller Homeric another war reparation originally
the former German liner Columbus it was an odd trio but their matching was driven by necessity
white star was finally ready to face the 1920s and beyond and compete with Cunard as best they could
to create visual consistency across the fleet and perhaps to refresh the brand a little
the Olympics gold sheer line was lowered along with that of Homeric and Majestic so that it sat
further down on the hull from 1922 on Olympic recorded some of her fastest
crossings averaging speeds in excess of 22 knots and even recording a speed record of 24.2 knots
this good turn of speed came in handy in 1923 when the united states lines ss Levithan which was also
originally a German-built liner the same class as majestic was overtaken by Olympic in a storm
this sparked a friendly rivalry between the two ships who unofficially raced against one another
but leviathan had the upper hand thanks to an extra 40 000 horsepower in her engines by the
mid-1920s it was clear that majestic was carrying a larger number of passengers compared to Olympic
thanks in no small part to that ship's huge second and third class capacity Olympic however was still
a favourite for the rich and famous and she was probably one of the most popular liners afloat
by 1927 white star line was planning to build and introduce a new super lighter in excess of
1 000 feet long and by far the most luxurious ship afloat the company had wanted to replace Homeric
which just wasn't in the same league as majestic and Olympic so to prepare for the change Olympic
would need to be modernized and refitted the late 1920s were a totally different world to that which
had existed when the Olympic class was first dreamt up in 1909 by white star line executives
would Olympic be able to keep up with the shifting social changes of the 1920s or would she be left
behind a relic of the Edwardian age the next time we visit Olympics career we'll take a look at how
White Star Line was able to refresh the ship and keep it abreast of all the social change that was
happening in the late 1920s because even all the way through until her scrapping in the early 1930s
Olympic was still a favourite on the transatlantic service ladies and gentlemen it's your friend mike
brady from ocean liner designs thank you so much for watching this video please think about liking
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the link down in the description until then stay safe stay happy and I'll see you again next time