Memories of The Canberra

And the anniversary was special for one local man.

For, Jack McAlister, from Highfield Drive, was lucky enough to work on the magnificent vessel, before he joined the RAF.

The ship was built for P&O, to operate a service between the UK and Australia. It entered service in 1961 before being refitted as a cruise liner in 1974.

The ship’s finest hour came in 1982, when it was requisitioned by the Ministry of Defence as a troop ship and it played a vital role transporting servicemen to the heart of the Falklands conflict.

As an apprentice draughtsman, Jack’s first job was at the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast. During his training Jack had to spend six months in each department in the iconic shipyard.

Then, in 1959, he was sent to the engine works where the engine, of the Canbera, the last great liner to be made in Belfast, was being constructed.

Jack told The Times: “There were about 20,000 workers in the shipyard at that time.

“During my time there I was out on trial trips on many boats, a cargo ship called ‘The Devon Lough’ and even an American tanker.

“But The Canberra was different. It had an electro turbine engine. That means that a boiler was used to produce steam, which then drove the turbine which produced electricity for a motor to drive the propeller.

“This was a very sophisticated engine, but it was much cheaper to run than the diesel engines we had been used to. The only thing you needed to run it was water,” explained Jack.

Jack, originally from Bushmills, spend four months in the engine works before joining the RAF. The ship was launched a month after Jack left Belfast for a 12-year spell in the RAF in which he served across the world, in places like Cyprus and Singapore.

“Even in my time in the RAF this great ship was always in the back of my mind,” he says.

“It was the first ship to be made of aluminium, it was a truly magnificent structure. Down through the years I saw many pictures and photographs of it and was proud to think that I had worked on it.

“Even though I moved to Australia myself for some 30 years, I never ran across the finished ship.

“I travelled to Australia by boat at that time, and it took some 28 days as the Suez Canal was closed. We had a magnificent cruise stopping off in the Canary Island and South Africa.

“To be honest when I found out that the 50th anniversary of the ship was earlier this month, it brought back some very fond memories of my time in the shipyard, even though I didn’t get to see the finished article.”