MAIDEN VOYAGE

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 112, 4 February 1939, Page 13

MAIDEN VOYAGE

Dominion Monarch To Start Shortly AN EMPIRE BROADCAST An Empire shipping event of outstanding interest and importance this month will be the departure from London on February 1G and Southampton the following day of the Shaw, Savill and Albion Company’s quadruple-screw motor-liner Dominion Monarch, on her inaiden voyage to New Zealand, via South Africa and Australia. Cabled advice received yesterday by the Wellington office of the Shaw, Savill and Albion Company, Ltd., stated that at a representative luncheon to be held on board the Dominion Monarch next Friday, the speeches of Lord Essendon, chairman of the company, and Mr. Oliver Stanley, President of the Board of Trade, will be broadcast for twenty minutes in the Empire programmes. Transmission to New Zealand and Australia will start at 9.15 a.m., Greenwich mean time, on February 11. .

On the day the Dominion Monarch departs from Southampton, a five minutes broadcast will take place direct from the ship in the English Channel, and will include messages from Mr. John MacMillan, general manager of the Shaw, Savill and Albion Company, Ltd., who will be a passenger by the ship to New Zealand, and Captain W. H. Hartman, commander of the great liner. If this broadcast is successful, it possibly will be reproduced in the Empire news at 10.15 a.m., Greenwich mean time, February 18.

As at present arranged, the outward itinerary of the Dominion Monarch will be as follows: Southampton, depart Friday, February 17; arrive Teneriffe 7 a.m., depart 1 p.m. February 21; arrive Cape Town 7 a.m., depart 6 p.m. March 3; arrive Durban noon, depart 5 p.m. March 5; arrive Fremantle 6 a.m., depart 6 p.m. March 15; arrive Melbourne noon, depart 10 p.m. March 19; arrive Sydney 7 a.m., depart 10 p.m. March 21; arrive Wellington 6 a.m., March. 25. The Dominion Monarch, which is a magnificently appointed liner of 27,155 tons gross register, will be by far the largest ship to be employed regularly in the Australian and New Zealand trade, and, with the exception of the Empress of Britain, will be the largest merchant ship ever seen in these waters. She is also the most powerful British motor-liner.