Rainbow Warrior (1955)
A vector drawing of Rainbow Warrior
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| History | |
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| Name: |
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| Owner: |
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| Operator: |
 Greenpeace (1978–1985) |
| Port of registry: | Amsterdam, Netherlands |
| Builder: | Hall, Russell & Company, Aberdeen, UK |
| Launched: | 1955 |
| Acquired: | 1977 |
| Fate: | |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Trawler |
| Tonnage: | 418 GT |
| Length: | 40 m (131 ft 3 in) |
| Draught: | 4.6 m |
| Propulsion: | 2 engines, 620 m² of sails |
| Speed: |
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Rainbow Warrior was a former UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) trawler called the Sir William Hardy. She was purchased by the environmental organization Greenpeace UK – an office established in May 1977 with Susi Newborn, Denise Bell, David McTaggart, Charlie Hutchison and Allan Thornton as directors. The ship was active in supporting a number of Greenpeace anti-whaling, -seal hunting, -nuclear testing and -nuclear waste dumping campaigns during the late 1970s and early 1980s. She was sunk whilst in Auckland harbour in New Zealand by operatives of the French intelligence service (DGSE) on 10 July 1985, killing photographer Fernando Pereira.
Sir William Hardy was built in 1955, in Aberdeen, Scotland and entered service with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. She served until 1977 when she was put up for sale by the Ministry. She was acquired by Greenpeace UK at a cost of £37,000 and underwent a four-month refit. She was re-launched on 2 May 1978 as Rainbow Warrior (named by Susi Newborn after the book Warriors of the Rainbow which had been given to her by Greenpeace founder, Robert Hunter. The book's rhetoric included this passage: "The world is sick and dying, the people will rise up like Warriors of the Rainbow...). After a series of high-profile campaigns in the North Atlantic, including two escapes from captivity in Spain resulting in the resignation of the Admiral of the Spanish Navy, Rainbow Warrior made her way to North America where she underwent modification in 1981 and the fitting of sails in a ketch rig in 1985.
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