Monday, March 12, 2007

PRINCÍPE PERFEITO MEMORIES

When I started photographing ships seriously back in February 1975, the Companhia Nacional de Navegação flagship PRINCIPE PERFEITO was doing her final voyages between Lisbon and Angola. On 11 March 1975 she left the Alcantara passenger ship terminal at 12h00 as usual but above her in the sky there were Portuguese Air Force combat aircrafts, while in Lisbon a tentative revolution known as the 11 March was going on...
She did return to Lisbon the following April and went into lay up at the CNN terminal at Santa Apolonia, but there were so many Portuguese nationals awating for transportation in Angola that one final PRINCIPE PERFEITO voyage was arranged. She left Lisbon in May returning fully booked in June 1975.
She was later used as an accommodation ship in Lisbon and spent several months laid up at the Mar da Palha until in April 1976 she sailed for Newcastle to be delivered to new owners and exactly at her place of birth in 1961-1961, the PRINCIPE PERFEITO became the AL HASA under Panamian registry...
Photo: The PRINCIPE PERFEITO arriving Durban in the mid sixties already with cargo booms in white. Behind a row of cargo liners from Ellerman, Lloyd Triestino, Moore-McorMack Lines and Chargueurs Reunis, the then new RMS TRANSVAAL CASTLE can be seen alongside the passenger terminal. Soon she became the S. A. Vaal of Safmarine. (LMC collection post card)

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