Transport: First Order

“The proposed liner will be the safest on the seas and the largest American ship ever built.” Thus Chairman Joseph Patrick Kennedy last week announced the first, long heralded construction contract awarded by the Maritime Commission— a complicated deal whereby the Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co. will build to order of the Government a $15,750,000 flagship for the United States Lines. The Government will put up at least $5,250,000 as a subsidy and add, if necessary, $2,362,500 more for possible cost increases while the ship is under construction. U. S. L. will put up one-quarter of the contract price and, not counting what may be realized by selling the Leviathan for scrap, get a spanking new flagship for about $3,937,500 cash—payable as the ship is built. The $6,562,000 balance will be left to be serviced and repaid over 20 years at about $350,000 a year.

In 1940, when the liner is completed she will be a six-day ship, 723 ft. long and 92 ft. abeam, will accommodate 1,200 passengers in three classes. Her detailed specifications have not been revealed but she is expected to be air-conditioned, electro-turbine driven, to have cabin rooms all with bath and super-sports decks. She will be 55 ft. longer and six feet wider and 10,000 tons heavier than the U. S. liners Washington & Manhattan. But with her 34,000 tons she will rank but twelfth in size among the passenger ships of the world, just after the French Line’s old reconditioned Paris. In the opinion of many seamen and shipping men, like North German Lloyd’s Commodore Leopold Ziegenbein, co-designer of both the Bremen and Europa, the “ideal size for ease of handling and economy of operation is about 33,000 tons.”

With a fine agreement for such a ship in its pocket, U. S. L. promptly called for bids on the seventh largest vessel afloat, the 23-year-old Leviathan, a third of whose life has been spent idle in U. S. harbors. The U. S. Government allowed Germany $12,000,000 for her after the War, spent more than $9,000,000 on reconditioning, sold her twice—both times losing money. This time she is to be sold in two parts—the hull and furnishings separately. Big bidders are expected to be Britain and Japan. Far too big to tow, if she is sold outside the U. S., her rusted hulk, the pride of pre-War Germany and post-War U. S., will have to depart from Hoboken under her own steam.