Editing SS Great Eastern (section)

===1862–1884: Later career===

====''Great Eastern'' Rock incident====
[[File:SS Great Eastern in New York Harbor by Stacy.jpg|thumb|left|Berthed at New York, 1860]]
On 17 August 1862, ''Great Eastern'' departed from Liverpool for New York, carrying 820 passengers and several thousand tons of cargo – given the size of her load, she was drawing {{convert|30|ft|m|0|order=flip}} of water.<ref name=":9">Dugan (1952) pp. 139, 145</ref> After outrunning a small squall, the ship approached the New York coast on the night of 27 August. Fearing that ''Great Eastern'' was resting too low in the water to pass by Sandy Hook, the ship's captain instead chose the nominally safer route through Long Island Sound. While passing by Montauk Point around 2:00 AM, the ship collided with an uncharted rock needle (later named Great Eastern Rock) that stood around {{convert|26|ft|m|0|order=flip}} below the surface. The rock punctured the outer hull of the ship, leaving a gash {{convert|9|ft|m|order=flip}} wide and {{convert|83|ft|m|order=flip}} long{{snd}}it was later calculated that the needle was large enough to contact the inner hull, but that the outer hull and strong transverse braces had prevented the inner hull from being breached. The collision was noticed by the crew, who guessed that the ship had struck a shifting sand shoal, and after a bilge check ''Great Eastern'' continued onto New York without incident.<ref>{{cite web | last = Brander | first = Roy | title = The RMS Titanic and its Times: When Accountants Ruled the Waves | work = Elias Kline Memorial Lecture, 69th Shock & Vibration Symposium | url = http://www.cuug.ab.ca/~branderr/risk_essay/Kline_lecture.html | access-date =26 August 2008}}</ref> While in port, however, it was noticed that the ship had acquired a slight list to starboard, and so a diver was sent in to inspect the hull. After several days of inspection, the diver reported the large hole in the ship's outer hull, a major issue as no drydock in the world could fit the ship.<ref name=":9" /> The ship's hull was repaired by metalworkers in a [[cofferdam]], but cost the company $350,000 and delayed the ship's return to Britain by several months.<ref name=":9" /> She would make one more trip to New York and back in 1863 before being laid up until 1864 due to her operating costs.<ref name=":10">Dugan (1952) pp. 160–164, 207</ref>

In January 1864, it was announced that the ship would be auctioned off. During the auction, four members of the company board of directors bid $125,000 for the ship and won it, thus acquiring personal control of the vessel. The group then allowed the ship company to go bankrupt, thus separating the ship from the now defunct shipping company and divesting many smaller stockholders. The ship was then contracted out to [[Cyrus West Field]], an American financier, who intended to use it to lay underwater cables.<ref name=":10" /> The ship's owners developed a [[business model]] whereby they would rent out ''Great Eastern'' as a cable layer in exchange for shares in cable companies, ensuring that if ''Great Eastern'' succeeded in laying cables, the unprofitable ship could be personally lucrative for her owners.<ref name=":10" />

====Cable laying====
In May 1865, ''Great Eastern'' steamed to Sheerness to take on wire for the laying of the [[Transatlantic telegraph cable]]. In return for using the ship, her owners wanted $250,000 in telegraph company stock, but only on the condition the wire laying succeeded.<ref name=":11">Dugan (1952) pp. 167, 172–188</ref> To accommodate the {{convert|13950|mi|km|order=flip}} of cable she was carrying, ''Great Eastern'' had some of her salons and rooms replaced with large tanks to hold the cable. In July the ship began laying the undersea cable near [[Valentia Island]], gradually working her way west at a speed of {{cvt|6|kn|km/h|order=flip}}. The effort went relatively smoothly for several weeks, but the cable end was lost mid-Atlantic in an accident, forcing the ship to return in 1866 with a new line. The ship's first officer, [[Robert Halpin]], managed to locate the lost cable end and the unbroken cable made it to shore in [[Heart's Content, Newfoundland and Labrador|Heart's Content, Newfoundland]] on 27 July 1866.<ref name=":11" />

Halpin became captain of ''Great Eastern'', with the ship laying further cables.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Taylor |first=Richard |date=June 2021 |title=The Halpin Memorial Medal |page=146|journal=Orders & Medals Research Society Journal|volume=60 |issue=2|issn=1474-3353}}</ref> In early 1869 she laid a series of undersea cables near Brest.<ref>Dugan (1952) pp. 208–217</ref> Later that year she was outfitted to lay undersea cables in the Indian Ocean; most of the operation's expenses were covered by the British government and banks in India, which hoped to circumvent the unreliable overland cables linking Britain to India.<ref name=":0" /> In preparation for operations in the hot climate, the ship was painted white to deflect heat away from the ship's cable tanks. ''Great Eastern'' departed from Britain in December 1869, arriving in Bombay (now Mumbai) 83 days later to lay her first cable anchor. Upon her arrival in port, ''Great Eastern''<nowiki/>'s size generated considerable public interest, with the captain offering tickets to view the ship for 2 rupees apiece, distributing proceeds to the crew.<ref name=":0" /> Departing from Bombay before the onset of the Monsoon season, she proceeded north to lay a cable between Bombay and Aden. From Aden, she laid another cable to the island of [[Jabal al-Tair Island|Jabal al-Tair]], where a second ship rendezvoused with her to take up the cable to Suez and then on to Alexandria.<ref name=":0" />

====Suez Canal concerns====
The [[Suez Canal]], which opened in 1869, was a setback for the ship, as at the time the channel was too shallow for ''Great Eastern'' to navigate. Going around Africa it would not be able to compete with ships that could use the canal. Ali Rischdi, a famed Arab navigator, proposed taking the ship through the canal, but this was never attempted.<ref name=":0" />