Editorial: Remembering the sinking of the Princess Victoria, the worst peace-time disaster in Northern Ireland

Everyone over the age of 75 remembers it and everyone over the age of 50 has heard of it.

The sinking of the Stranraer to Larne ferry near to Donaghadee remains the worst peace-time disaster in the history of the province, with 135 deaths among the 179 people on board.

It was traumatic at the time in part because, while it might not be obvious now transport seemed modern and safe then.

Boat safety had improved markedly after the Titanic disaster 41 years before.

By 1953, years after the end of the Second World War, the age of mass travel was slowly beginning and the Princess Victoria was a pioneering rollon, rolloff ferry, in which cars drive straight on and off. Prior to that vehicles were lifted aboard by crane.

Passenger flight however was still in its infancy, and the fact that a MP, Sir Walter Smiles, died aboard the boat coming back from Westminster is a reminder that most human movement between London and NI was then by train and ship (although 24 passengers had died in a plane crash at Nutt's Corner weeks earlier).

All the officers of the Princess Victoria went down with the vessel, as was the brave ethos of the time.

Few people had TV in 1953, so newspapers such as this one were central to their way of finding out the news of what happened.

Lessons were learned about ship construction after the Princess Victoria disaster. Also, weather warnings are now highly sophisticated, which they were not then.

The world is far, far safer now.

As we remember the dead on Tuesday, we can give thanks that such tragedies are far less likely now (and there has never been a disater on the same scale in British waters since).