SS Noronic

SS Noronic moored in Toronto, 1930
History
Canada
Name:	SS Noronic
Owner:	Canada Steamship Lines
Builder:	Western Dry Dock and Shipbuilding Company, Port Arthur, Ontario
Launched:	June 2, 1913
Nickname(s):	The Queen of the Lakes
Fate:	Destroyed by fire, September 17, 1949
General characteristics
Type:	Passenger ship
Tonnage:	6,095 GRT
Length:	362 ft (110 m)
Draft:	28 ft 9 in (8.76 m)
Decks:	5
Capacity:	600 passengers
Crew:	200

SS Noronic was a passenger ship that was destroyed by fire in Toronto Harbour in September 1949 with the loss of at least 118 lives.

SS Noronic was launched June 2, 1913 in Port Arthur, Ontario, Canada. She was built by the Western Dry Dock and Shipbuilding Company for the Northern Navigation Company, an operating division of Canada Steamship Lines (CSL), to perform passenger and package freight service on the Great Lakes. She had five decks, was 362 feet (110 m) in length, and measured 6,095 gross register tons. At maximum capacity, she could hold 600 passengers and 200 crew. One of the largest and most beautiful passenger ships in Canada at the time, she was nicknamed “The Queen of the Lakes."

Passenger decks were labelled A, B, C and D, and none had direct gangplank access to the dock. The only exits were located on the lowest deck, E deck. There were two gangplanks on the port side and two on the starboard side, and only two were operational at a time.

The Noronic had two fleetmate ships, Huronic (1902) and Hamonic. The Hamonic burned in 1945 with one fatality and Huronic was retired and scrapped in 1950.

On September 14, 1949, the Noronic embarked on a seven-day pleasure cruise of Lake Ontario from Detroit, Michigan. The Noronic departed from Detroit and picked up additional passengers at Cleveland. She was scheduled to travel to Prescott, Ontario and the Thousand Islands before returning via Toronto and Detroit to Sarnia, where she would have remained over the winter. She was carrying 524 passengers, all but 20 of whom were American, and 171 crew members, all Canadian. The captain on the voyage was Capt. William Taylor.