Photo by Rodney Hall

Manchester Crusade - the last of four cellular vessels built for the Manchester-Montreal 5 day service, shown here mooring up at the Manchester terminal.

The second vessel, Manchester Courage, on her arrival from the builders, suffered a control failure due to swarf left in the controllable pitch propeller system, the pencil filter in the KaMeWa propeller hydraulic control box which had blocked up. Entering one of the Ship Canal locks, instead of going astern, the propeller went full ahead, with the vessel ploughing through the lock gates and wedging herself in the aperture. As a result, the canal was closed for many weeks whilst the Courage was extricated and repaired and the lock gates replaced. There was quite a bit of flooding down the canal. During this time, Manchester dockworkers had to be bussed daily to Liverpool and Manchester Liners' service was drastically affected, using chartered vessels to maintain the service fro Liverpool. There is no doubt in my mind that this contributed to the Manchester Ship Canal's eventual demise. In 1979, Manchester Courage was sold to Liberia and renamed Pacific Container.