SHIPS OF THE CENTURY

PANAMA (1939)
September 8, 1934 changed everything. That day, the passenger ship Morro Castle burned off the coast of Asbury Park, N.J., killing 126 passengers and crew. Passenger ships would never be designed the same way again.

Following the Morro Castle disaster, naval architect George G. Sharp and a small group of others began research into fire control aboard passenger vessels. He was named chairman of a U.S. Senate subcommittee which investigated the possibilities of fireproof construction in tests conducted on the S.S. Nantucket in 1936 and 1937. As a result of these tests, new and unique American regulations for fireproof construction of stateroom enclosures were formulated and put into effect that year.
Sharp's answer to fireproof ship construction was the 493 ft, 326 passenger S.S. Panama.

The first of three 10,000 gt passenger ships, the Panama emerged from Bethlehem Steel's Fore River shipyard in Quincy, Mass., in 1939. The Panama and its sisters, the Ancon and Cristobal were hailed as "the beginning of a new era in shipbuilding standards of safety, efficiency, comfort and attractiveness." All three ships were built by the Panama Railroad Steamship Co. for a total cost of $12.1 million.
The May 1939 issue of Marine Engineering and Shipping Review reported, "Completely fireproof from stem to stern, the Panama has been identified by its owners as the vessel with 'nothing to burn but the fuel.'"

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