Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The SS Warrimoo

Episode Date: January 2, 2021

In the waning days of the 19th century, a passenger steamer crossing the Pacific Ocean en route from Australia to Canada did a particular thing, at a particular place, at a particular time. If it wasn’t for a last-second decision of the captain of the ship, we wouldn’t be talking about the ship today and it would have been forgotten in history. Learn more about the SS Warrimoo, and how it and its spontaneous captain made history on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the waning days of the 19th century, a passenger steamer crossing the Pacific Ocean en route from Canada to Australia did a particular thing at a particular place at a particular time. If it wasn't for a last second decision of the captain of the ship, we wouldn't be talking about the ship today and it would have been forgotten to history. Learn more about the SS Waramu and how its spontaneous captain made history on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Fear is the virus is trending on TikTok. Vaccines are poison. Then your yoga teacher says that sex traffic children are being sacrificed by satanic liberals. But it's all okay. The Great Awakening is coming.

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all one word at checkout. Sometimes you just happen to be at the right place at the right time. That is exactly what happened with the SS Waramu over 120 years ago. Launched in 1882 in England, it was a passenger steamer. After multiple changes in ownership, it eventually found its way into the hands of the New Zealand and Australian steamship company, who used the ship on a regular run to move passengers between Sydney, Australia and Vancouver, Canada. In 1889, the captain of the Waramu was Captain John Philip. On December 15th, the ship left Vancouver on their last voyage of the year,

heading across the Pacific towards Sydney. The ship had on board 32 passengers. About halfway through the journey on a clear night with good weather, the ship's navigational officer performed a routine check of the location of the ship via the stars. The navigator reported their position as 0.30 minutes north latitude, and 179 degrees 30 minutes west longitude. The first mate casually noted that there were only a couple miles away from where the international date line crossed the equator.

This gave the captain an idea. He sent his crew out on deck to double and triple check their location. Once he had verified their location, he set a new course and adjusted the speed of the ship. At the stroke of midnight, he ordered the ship to stop and announced, We're here. Captain Philip had achieved a navigational coup. The date when he set the course of the ship was December 30th, 1889, just east of the International Date Line. When the ship stopped at midnight, it was positioned exactly where the International Dateline and the equator met.

The ship was pointed in a southwesterly direction. And here is what was so interesting about where the ship was. The bow of the ship was in the southern hemisphere, and the after the ship was in the northern hemisphere. The bow was in the summer and the aft was in the winter. In the front of the ship, it was January 1st, 1900. In the back of the ship, it was December 31st, 1899. The ship was simultaneously in different days, months, years, seasons, centuries, and, of course, hemispheres. And please don't be a party pooper and send me email saying that the 20th century didn't start until 1901.

They were the first people to usher in the year 1900. The feat that the ship pulled off was done spontaneously, and it wasn't really planned. They just happened to be at the right place at the right time and took advantage of the situation. After a bit, the ship set off again towards Sydney to complete its voyage. The entire fare didn't take that long, and it was mostly forgotten. There was only a small one paragraph mention in the Sydney Morning Herald of the ship arriving and gave a vague mention of the ship crossing the equator on December 30th, which it technically did, as on the stroke of midnight, it became December 31st and January 1st

on the other side of the dateline when they reached the spot. In fact, for 42 years, the entire event was forgotten. Then, in 1942, a Canadian newspaper wrote an article titled, In Two Places, in Two Centuries, at one time, which told the tale of the SS Waramu. The story gained further popularity in 19th, from author John Euler, who wrote about it in Ships and the Sea magazine. This began a host of controversies about the ship. In particular, did it really happen, and could it have really happened?

The main objection was that the technology at the time just didn't have that level of accuracy. Using stellar navigation, sextants, and ship clocks, they were able to get accuracy only down to about 200 meters. Others contend that between the ship's captain and navigator, they had 50 years of maritime experience between them, and such a thing wouldn't have been that difficult, especially on a clear, calm night like they had. Sadly, no one's ever been able to find the ship's logs to verify what really happened. The ship itself was recruited into service in World War I and was sunk due to friendly fire in 1918. It now lies at the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea. A hundred years later, with much better navigational equipment, the USS Topeka, a Los Angeles-class nuclear-powered submarine,

did the same thing to usher in the year 2000. Officially, they were there to test the Navy software for Y2K bugs. There were several major differences between what the Topeka did and what the Waramu did. First, the Topeka was 400 meters or 1,300 feet below the surface. Second, they were able to accurately confirm their position via GPS. And finally, not only were they in different days, months, years, seasons, and hemispheres, but they also had the distinction of being in totally different millennia. Executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is James McAlla.

The associate producer is Thor Thompson. Today's five-star reviews come from Podcast Republic. The first review is from listener Herrera, who writes, professionally informative and entertaining. Thanks a lot. Listener Steve wrote, Very good and informative. Thank you very much, Stephen Herrera,

and thanks to all of you who have left reviews for the show. Remember, if you leave a five-star review, you too can have your review read on the show.