SS Rex
Interception of the Rex in 1938 Interception of the Rex in 1938
Career	Flag of Italy
Owners:	Italian Line
Built:	by G. Ansaldo & Co. of Sestri Ponente, Genoa, Italy
Launched:	1931
Maiden voyage:	September 27, 1932
Fate:	Destroyed by Allied bombers in 1944
General characteristics
Tonnage:	51,062 gross tons
Length:	880 feet (268.8 m)
Beam:	96 feet (29.3 m)
Power:	Steam turbines, powered by fuel oil
Propulsion:	Quadruple screws
Speed:	28 knots
Passenger Capacity:	604 first-class, 378 second-class, 410 tourist-class, 866 third-class, total 2,258

The SS Rex was an Italian ocean liner launched in 1931.^[1] It held the westbound Blue Riband between 1933 and 1935. Originally built for the Navigazione Generale Italiana, its state-ordered merger with the Lloyd Sabaudo line meant that the ship sailed for the newly created Italian Line. In May 1938, in a demonstration of U.S. air power, YB-17 bombers of the U.S. Army Air Corps intercepted the Rex at sea in a highly publicized event.

The Rex operated transatlantic crossings from Italy with its running mate, the . On 8 September 1944, off Koper, Rex was hit by 123 rockets launched by RAF aircraft, caught fire from stem to stern, rolled onto the port side, and sank in shallow water. The ship was broken up at the site beginning in 1947.

History

Following North German Lloyd's successful capture of the Blue Riband with its and duo of ocean liners, the Rex was intended to be Italy's effort to do the same. Amid great competition from other steamship companies, the Italian Line carried out a very attractive and enthusiastic publicity campaign for its two largest liners, the Rex and the Conti di Savoia.

The first-class grand staircase aboard the Rex, demonstrating the liner's classic interiors

Both ships were dubbed "The Riviera afloat". To carry the theme even further, sand was scattered in the outdoor swimming pools, creating a beach-like effect highlighted by multicolored umbrellas.^[2] Both ships were decorated in a classical style while the norm of the time was the Art Deco or the so called "Liner Style" that had been premiered onboard the French Line?s in 1927. The ship?s exterior design had followed the trend set by Germany?s Bremen and Europa. The Rex sported a long hull with a moderately raked bow, two working funnels, but still featured the old-type overhanging stern found on such liners as the and .

The first of this pair to be completed was, appropriately, the largest and fastest. It was christened the Rex in August 1931 in the presence of King Emmanuel III and Queen Elena. In its goal of a record-breaking maiden voyage, its first run was a dismal failure. It sailed from Genoa in September, 1932, after a send off from Premier Benito Mussolini, with a passenger list of international celebrities. Unfortunately, while approaching Gibraltar, serious mechanical difficulties arose. Repairs took three days. Half its passengers requested to leave. Further complications arose on the Atlantic; lengthy repairs were required in New York before returning to Europe.^[3]

In August 1933, the Rex fulfilled the promises of its designers and captured the Blue Riband on its westbound crossing with a time of four days and thirteen hours, with an average speed of 28.92 knots.^[4] This record would last until 1935 when it was captured by the French Line's . Following the outbreak of World War II both the Rex and Conte di Savoia continued regular sailings to the Mediterranean as if totally unaffected by events in Northern Europe. In the end Italian liners proved to be among the final ships trading on a commercial basis. Their sailings ceased in the spring of 1940 and they were returned to Italian ports for safekeeping. Ultimately however this effort proved futile as the Rex was destroyed by Allied bombers in 1944 in a successful effort to prevent German forces from using the liner to blockade the port of Trieste.^[5]

The remains of Rex - about one fifth of the ship, mostly unrecognizable metal parts - are located off the Slovenian coast in the Gulf of Koper. The rest was scavenged for iron in the 1950s by the local government, and it is said that the ship was the largest Slovenian "iron mine" at the time.^[6]

SS Rex in culture

• Federico Fellini, in one of the most famous scenes of his semi-autobiographical film Amarcord, depicts his youth memories of the passage of the Rex near his hometown Rimini, when many inhabitants of the little town went to salute the ocean liner from small rowboats. The characters see the huge ship, appearing in the night with its thousands of lights on, as a symbol of the technological progress and of the hope for a better future.

See also

• Italian Line

References

External links

• Classic Liners of Long Ago
• The Myth and the Legend, a page dedicated to the ship Rex (sl,it,de)

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