SS Empire Tower
World War II merchant ship of the United Kingdom / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
SS Empire Tower was a British 4,378 GRT cargo ship built in 1935 and sunk by enemy action in 1943.
History | |
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United Kingdom | |
Name | SS Roxburgh[1] |
Namesake | Roxburgh, Scotland |
Owner | B.J. Sutherland & Co.[1] |
Port of registry | Newcastle-upon-Tyne |
Builder | Burntisland Shipbuilding Company Ltd, Fife, Scotland[2] |
Launched | March 1935[2] |
Identification |
|
Fate | Sold 1937[2] |
History | |
Name | SS Tower Field[1] |
Owner | Tower Steamship Co. |
Operator | Counties Ship Management, London[1] |
Port of registry | London |
Out of service | 19 October 1941[1] |
Identification |
|
Fate | Ran aground & broke in two[3] |
Name | SS Empire Tower[1] |
Owner | Ministry of War Transport[1] |
Operator | Counties Ship Management, London[1] |
Port of registry | London |
In service | December 1942[1] |
Out of service | 5 March 1943[1] |
Identification | UK official number 161579[2] |
Fate | Torpedoed and sunk by U-130, 5 March 1943[1] |
General characteristics | |
Type | cargo ship[2] |
Tonnage | |
Length | 372.0 ft (113.4 m)[2] |
Beam | 52.4 ft (16.0 m)[2] |
Draught | 24 ft 5 in (7.44 m)[2] |
Depth | 25.2 ft (7.7 m)[2] |
Installed power | 335 NHP |
Propulsion | triple expansion steam engine;[2] single screw |
Crew | 39 plus 6 DEMS gunners[1] |
She was built by the Burntisland Shipbuilding Company Ltd. in Fife, Scotland. The North Eastern Marine Engineering Co. Ltd. of Sunderland built her 335 NHP three-cylinder triple expansion steam engine.[2] She had six corrugated furnaces with a combined heating surface of 117 square feet (11 m2) heat to heat her three 180 lbf/in2 single-ended boilers, which had a combined heating surface of 5,445 square feet (506 m2).[2] She was fitted with direction finding equipment.[2]
She was launched as SS Roxburgh for B.J. Sutherland and Company of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.[1] In 1937 the Tower Hill Steamship Company, an offshoot of Counties Ship Management, bought her and renamed her SS Tower Field.[1]