Titanic Articles: Phillipe Delaunoy's Harland And Wolff Visit

 

Our Trip To Belfast.

Last April, my wife and I decided to make a trip to Ireland. It was not long before I suggested to her we make a short visit to Belfast and take part in the 'Titanic - made in Belfast' celebrations!

We arrived in Dublin on 16th April and visited the city. We made our way to Belfast the following day. Due to railway problems we arrived at the Belfast Station about 12 o'clock. We had to take the last train to Dublin at 08:00 pm so we had very little time for visiting Belfast.

We decided to visit Belfast City Hall first and then take a bus to Queen's Road in order to meet Kathleen Neill from Belfast Industrial Heritage Ltd.

We then walked to the City Hall which is a fantastic building and visited the 'Titanic at Home' exhibition. The magnificent 18 ft long (1:54 scale) Titanic model was making a deep impression. On the first floor, you could see other interesting artefacts such as a deck chair, a life jacket, see picture on left, Titanic menus, and some Thomas Andrews documents and instruments.

It was 4:30 pm when we left the City Hall. We arrived at the Odyssey Arena 15 minutes later and walked to Queen's Road. Despite deep 'landscape' alterations the Old Administrative Building is still there. We pass the Abercorn Basin and the Hamilton Dock, walked through the archway and came across Kathleen. I said 'Bonjour' (with my best Belgian accent) so she had no doubt about my identity.

Kathleen guided us around Queen's Island. We first saw the Thompson Dry Dock and the pump house. Unfortunately we couldn't have access to the dock and building due to the fact that the dock's gate is in very bad state. Kathleen showed us some old steam cranes that could have been used for the Titanic's construction. We then gone to the slipways, perhaps the most moving experience of our visit. Some remnants of the Arrol Gantries are still there, so you could have a better sight of the "cathedral" that was there 93 years ago.

We then came back to Kathleen's office (or Kathleen's mess!) and had a good warm coffee. Kathleen showed us the project for the redevelopment of Queen's Island, the preservation of the Administrative Building and, of course, the potential future of the Nomadic in Belfast.

We then had to go (sadly) back to the station after 6 hours of delights!

We promised to come back later . hopefully for the restoration of the Nomadic!

 

TT
H&W Drawing Office	H&W Thompson Dry Dock	H&W Thompson Dry Dock Pump House
H&W Slipways No.2 & No.3.	H&W Steam Cranes	Belfast Exhibition - Deckchair
Belfast Exhibition - Model Titanic	Belfast Exhibition - Model Titanic	Belfast Exhibition - Model Titanic