SS Mesaba was a British passenger and cargo ship of 6,833 GRT in operation between 1898 and 1918. She was torpedoed and sunk by SM UB118 21 nautical miles (39 km) east of the Tuskar Rock in the Irish Sea on September 1, 1918, with the loss of 20 of her crew, while she was travelling from Liverpool, United Kingdom to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States.
She is well-known as one of the ships that sent warnings of pack ice ahead to the RMS Titanic (which never made it to that liner's bridge).
Construction[]
Mesaba was launched for the Atlantic Transport Line at the Harland & Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Northern Ireland on September 11, 1897, and completed on February 17, 1898. The ship was 146.9 meters (481 ft 11 in) long, had a beam of 15.8 meters (51 ft 10 in) and a depth of 9.4 meters (30 ft 10 in). She was assessed at 6,833 GRT and had a triple expansion engine producing 772 nhp, driving a single screw propeller. The ship could reach a maximum speed of 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph) and had four masts and one funnel. Her sister ships were Manitou, Marquette, Menominee and Mohegan.
Service[]
Winefreda originally sailed from London to New York from her Maiden Voyage on March 3, 1898, until June 1898, when she was renamed to Mesaba and continued to operate on that line. She collided with the Wilson Line ship Martello, before colliding with yet another liner, the Zeta, not much later on 4 October 1900 in New York harbor. Mesaba only received slight damage both times. She also made three trips from Antwerp to Boston and Philadelphia for the Red Star Line between 1912 and 1914. She resumed her usual sailing plan in June 1915. She was however involved in a third collision on 11 August 1918, coming together with the SS Lizard in the Irish Sea.
Titanic disaster[]
On the night of April 14, the RMS Titanic struck an iceberg and began to sink. Earlier in the day, she had received a series of warnings from other ships of drifting ice in the area of the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. One of those ships to send her a warning, was the Mesaba. At 7.50 PM on April 14, 1912, her wireless operator Stanley Adams sent her the ice warnings, but they never made it to the bridge of the Titanic despite them being received by Wireless Operator Jack Phillips at 9.40 PM.
Sinking[]
Mesaba departed Liverpool for Philadelphia in convoy OL32/OE21 on August 31, 1918, under the command of Captain Owen Percy Clarke. The following day, she was torpedoed and sunk by SM UB118, 21 nautical miles (39 km) east of the Tuskar Rock in the Irish Sea. Twenty of her crew were lost, including her captain and chief officer, with the remaining 78 rescued by the gunboat HMS Kildini, commanded by Lieutenant F.J. Silva.
Wreck[]
The wreck of Mesaba lies at (52°17′N 5°38′W) in 96 meters (314 feet) of water. The wreck, with its bow broken off, was positively identified by a team from the University of Bangor in September 2022 by the use of sonar. Before that, the wreck was believed to be that of SS City Of Glasgow, a passenger ship that was sunk on the same day and by the same U-boat while travelling in the same convoy as Mesaba close to her position.