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Welcome to our Arandora Star website celebrating this stylish and beautiful ship. She was originally built in 1927 by Cammell Laird in Birkenhead for Blue Star Line as the Arandora. She was one of the Luxury Five built in the 1920s for the South American service from London. She sailed on this service until 1928 when she was sent to be refitted as a cruise liner in 1929. She re-emerged as the white hulled Arandora Star. As a cruise liner she cruised to many different destinations including Norway, the Northern Capitals, the Mediterranean, the West Indies, Panama, Cuba, and Florida.

In 1939 with the onset of the Second World War the Arandora Star was requisitioned for troopship duties. In 1940 she evacuated troops from Norway and France but then sailed from Liverpool on what became her final voyage taking Axis Nationals and prisoners of war to Canada. She departed Liverpool on the 1st July 1940 unescorted bound for St Johns in Newfoundland, Canada and the Canadian internment camps. On board she had nearly 1,200 German and Italian internees including 86 POWs. There were also 374 British men on board in the form of miliary guards and the ship's crew. The ship bore no Red Cross sign. At 6.58 AM on the 2nd July 1940 off the northwest coast of Ireland, she was struck by a torpedo from the German submarine U-47, commanded by U-Boat ace Gunther Prien. It is assumed that U-47 mistook her grey wartime livery for that of an armed merchant cruiser. U-47 fired its single damaged torpedo at Arandora Star. All power was lost at once, and thirty five minutes after the torpedo impact, Arandora Star sank. Over eight hundred lives were lost. It was one of the worst maritime tragedies of the Second World War. 

This website aims to record the history of this fine ocean liner and commemorate her very tragic loss in the Second World War and act as a virtual home to honour and celebrate this fine ship. We hope you enjoy this website and when you leave we hope you will visit again soon.


   

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S.S. Arandora Star

~ One of the Luxury Five ~

















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Her Regular Service Route: Great Britain to South America

London to Lisbon, Las Palmas, Rio de Janiero, Santos, Montevideo and Buenos Aires "South American" service

BLUE STAR LINE LTD, LONDON





(c) The AJN Transport Britain Collection 2010                                                                                                                                                                                 A Edward Elliott