February 2013

RMS Queen Mary is a retired ocean liner that sailed primarily in the North Atlantic Ocean from 1936 to 1967 for the Cunard Line.

The ship was named after Mary of Teck, consort of King George V. Until her launch the name she was to be given was kept a closely guarded secret. Legend has it that Cunard intended to name the ship Victoria, in keeping with company tradition of giving its ships names ending in “ia”, but when company representatives asked the king’s permission to name the ocean liner after Britain’s “greatest queen”, he said his wife, Queen Mary, would be delighted. And so, the legend goes, the delegation had of course no other choice but call her the Queen Mary.

On 27 September she had completed her 1,000th and last crossing of the North Atlantic, having carried 2,112,000 passengers over 3,792,227 miles [6,102,998 km]. Under the command of Captain John Treasure Jones, who had been her captain since 1965, she sailed from Southampton for the last time on 31 October with 1,093 passengers and 806 crew. After an epic voyage around Cape Horn, she arrived in Long Beach on the 9th of December 1967.

The Bridge of the Americas crosses the pacific ocean approaching the Panama Canal at Balboa.  The bridge is a cantilever design where the suspended span is a tied arch. The bridge has a total of 14 spans reaching the length of 1,654 m (5,425 ft).  Originally named the Thatcher Ferry Bridge, after the original ferry which crossed the canal.  Named after Maurice H. Thatcher who was a member of the canal commission and who introduced the legislation.  The name was unpopular with the government of Panama, who preferred the Bridge of the Americas.  This Panamanian view was officiate, ten days prior to the inauguration, by a resolution of the National Assembly on October 2, 1962.  8°57′0″N,79°34′0″W

The Panama Canal locks system, with each passing, lifts each ship up 85 feet (26 metres) to the main elevation of the Panama Canal and down again. It has a total of six steps (three up, three down for a ship’s passage). The total length of the lock structures, including the approach walls, is over 3 kilometres. It was one of the greatest engineering works ever to be undertaken at the time, when they opened in 1914.  No other concrete construction of comparable size was undertaken until the Hoover Dam in the 1930s.

Miraflores is the name of one of the three locks that form part of the Panama Canal.  It is the name of the small lake that separates these locks from the Pedro Miguel locks upstream.