SS Tellus (1911)
Tellus was a steam cargo ship built in 1911 by the William Doxford & Sons of Pallion for the Wabanas Dampskibskompani, a subsidiary of Nova Scotia Steel & Coal Company and managed by Wilhelm Wilhelmsen. She was named after Tellus, the Earth goddess. Design and construction On 10 March 1911 it was reported that a new company "The Wabana Steamship Company" (Wabanas Dampskibskompani) with a capital of NOK 1,500,000 was registered in Nøtterøy with the purpose of transporting ore between Newfoundland and Europe. The new company was a subsidiary of the Nova Scotia Steel Company and was managed by Wilhelm Wilhelmsen. Two ships were leased to conduct the operations (SS Tellus and SS Themis) by the newly formed company for a period of 10 years. The ship was laid down in 1910 at William Doxford & Sons shipyard in Pallion. The vessel was launched on 31 January 1911 (yard number 417), and the sea trials were held on 8 March 1911 with the ship being able to reach speed of . After completion of her sea trials, the ship was delivered to her owner on the same day. On 10 March 1911 Tellus departed from Newcastle for Narvik where the ship was scheduled to take a load of iron ore for delivery to Philadelphia. As built, the ship was long (between perpendiculars) and abeam, a mean draft of . Tellus was assessed at 7,395 GRT, and 12,925 DWT which made her the largest ship in Scandinavia at the time. The vessel had a steel hull, and a single 412 nhp triple-expansion steam engine, with cylinders of , , and diameter with a stroke, that drove a single screw propeller, and moved the ship at up to . Operational history After completion Tellus loaded 11,000 tons of Swedish iron ore from the Kiruna-Luossavaara mines in Narvik and departed for her maiden journey on 18 March 1911 to Philadelphia, arriving there on 6 April. The cargo was assigned to the Warwick Iron & Steel Co. of Pottstown. The vessel departed from Philadelphia on 6 May and proceeded to Wabana, a mining site for the Nova Scotia Steel Company. After loading iron ore in Newfoundland, the ship departed Wabana on 6 June for Rotterdam. Tellus continued serving the Wabana-Rotterdam route through the end of 1913 during the open navigation period around Newfoundland, usually April through November. During winters, the ship was either chartered in North America to move iron ore from Wabana to Philadelphia, or to transport other cargo along the East Coast of the US, or was engaged in iron ore shipping from Narvik and Kirkenes area to Rotterdam. The ship experienced several accidents throughout her career. During her March 1912 trip from Narvik to Philadelphia with a cargo of iron ore she ran into some ice fields and experienced rough weather throughout her journey, arriving in Philadelphia on 16 March with some damage about the decks. After unloading the ship continued on to Tampa where she took on 7,900 tons of