Destinations knownCoronavirus: cruise ship that sailed from Hong Kong into trouble ‘inspires’ new tourist park in Cambodia
- The MS Westerdam, with its 2,257 passengers, was refused entry by five ports in February 2020, with authorities twitchy about outbreaks on board ships
- Cambodia came to the rescue, allowing the liner to dock at Sihanoukville. Now the country is creating a park that commemorates the ‘loving humanitarian gesture’.
It is almost 9,700km (6,000 miles) from Sihanoukville, Cambodia, to Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, as the crow flies (assuming that crow makes it through Ukrainian airspace), and eight decades separate World War II and the Age of Covid. Nevertheless, one ship’s name connects all of the above (except the crow).
Three vessels have sailed with the name Westerdam painted on their hulls, all for the Holland America Line (known as the Nederlandsche-Amerikaansche Stoomvaart Maatschappij until 1989, when the Dutch company was bought by British-American cruise operator Carnival Corporation). They have proved to be a hardy trio.
The first was sunk not once, but three times, before it even made its maiden voyage, according to the Holland America Line archives.
“Her keel was laid in Rotterdam on September 1, 1939, but construction was suspended when Germany invaded Holland in 1940. On August 27, 1942, the half-completed ship was bombed by Allied forces at its berth and sunk. German troops raised the ship, but in September 1944, it was sunk again, by Dutch underground resistance forces. Raised again by the Germans, it was sunk for the third time by the Dutch underground on January 17, 1945.”
After the war, the Westerdam was again refloated and construction was completed. From 1946 to 1965, the combined cargo/passenger vessel, with space for 143 first-class passengers, ran regular transatlantic services between Rotterdam and New York before being sold for scrap, which seems a cruel end for a ship that suffered such a traumatic birth.