Historedia
Episode 2 of 2

Launch of RMS Oceanic

When
14 January 1899
Where
Harland & Wolff's Queen's Island yard
Part of
White Star liner RMS Oceanic launched at Belfast as the largest ship afloat

RMS Oceanic was launched at Harland & Wolff's Queen's Island yard in Belfast on 14 January 1899 before a crowd of over 50,000 people.

The event drew an immense crowd, numbering more than 50,000 spectators. It was the last British transatlantic liner to be launched in the 19th century. Oceanic was the first to exceed the Great Eastern in length, measuring 704 ft according to the Oceanic-focused passages, though the SS Great Eastern article records 705 ft; the Great Eastern's length was 692 ft.

Sources

  1. RMS Oceanic Wikipedia, revision of 2026-06-24
  2. White Star Line Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-20
  3. SS Great Eastern Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-01

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.