A Little Bit Of Ship Banter: A Mid Ship Cinema Podcast

The audio companion to our YouTube video!

Peter Knego has just returned from a pilgrimage to Gent to pay his final respects to the MV ASTORIA, which was built in 1948 as Swedish American Lines STOCKHOLM and is best known for her collision with and sinking of the ANDREA DORIA on July 25, 1956. The STOCKHOLM went on to a long career as the East German cruise ship VOLKERFREUNDSCHAFT and was ultimately rebuilt in Italy in 1993/4 as the ITALIA PRIMA. After numerous name changes, she last sailed as the ASTORIA for Cruise and Maritime Voyages, which shut down at the outset of Covid in 2020. Laid up in Rotterdam, she rotted away until 2025, when sold to Galloo Recycling and was towed to Ghent, arriving on July 4. The ship is partially demolished and largely stripped but sadly and unnecessarily, the shipbreaker has destroyed all of the ship's artwork, Murano glass fittings and furnishings, despite many attempts by several potential purchasers to buy these things. This footage shows the ship on March 30 from both sides of the Schelde River in the process of demolition, shows many of the items that have been destroyed (in archival footage) and also some of the other ships that are being broken up at Galloo, including one dating from 1915. #classicships #scrapships #mvastoria #mvstockhom #ssandreadoria #shipbreaking #shipbreakers

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The audio companion to our latest video on our YouTube channel!

2026 marks the historic DELTA QUEEN's 100th year, which is a major milestone for any ship or boat to achieve. I spent a day on board at Houma, Louisiana, where she has been laid up since 2015, last month and look forward to sharing a full top to bottom tour and history of this American treasure soon. In the meantime, she is still intact and while a bit weathered by the harsh climate of Louisiana, still viable for restoration as a floating hotel/museum like her sister, DELTA KING in Sacramento or, probably less likely, a return to river cruise service if Congress will grant her a new extension. This video captures some external views of the boat and a few outtakes from her active days along the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers.

There is much more of this story to be told, so stay tuned...

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdD9Wz0x0O8&t=1s

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The companion to our latest YouTube video!

Despite having been having been completely stripped after being sold for scrap in 2024, the steamboat AMERICAN QUEEN and as of February 2026, is still structurally complete and lying at a scrapyard in Houma, Louisiana.  This video shows the AQ in mid-February of 2026 and then nostalgically traces her nearly 30 year career with footage taken between 1996 and 2018.  The AMERICAN COUNTESS is lying in front of the QUEEN and looks untouched by the shipbreakers despite also having been sold for scrap in 2024.  

In this episode, you will see the world's largest riverboat in her inaugural prime at New Orleans in 1996, sailing the Ohio River with Majestic America Line in 2007, being re christened by Priscilla Presley at Memphis in 2012 and racing with the BELLE OF LOUISVILLE in the Great Steamboat Race of 2012.  You will also see her lavish interiors, her steam whistle and calliope in action and much more.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekLQhYEqAyc

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The audio companion to our latest video on our MidShip Cinema YouTube channel.

This sad update with footage taken on 19 January 2026 shows the MV ASTORIA undergoing demolition at the Galloo Scrapyard in Ghent, Belgium. After an overnight tow from Rotterdam where the ship languished for years, she arrived at the yard on July 4, 2025. The stripping process took months, followed by the removal of the lifeboats and davits, then parts of the stern superstructure. In this footage, the bridge is gone and large cuts have been made for the removal of the remaining upper decks and funnel. The ASTORIA was built in 1948 for Swedish American Line as the STOCKHOLM and gained notoriety for colliding with and sinking the ANDREA DORIA on a foggy night off Nantucket in July of 1956. She went on to a long career under the East German flag and use as a refugee ship before being completely rebuilt in Italy in 1993/4. She has sailed for several owners in the interim, last operating as the MV ASTORIA for now defunct Cruise and Maritime Voyages. Her full story will eventually be told here. Music licensed from Artlist: "Downstream" by Muted. #classicships #andreadoria #scrapyard

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibQ38zlD6uo

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The audio companion to our latest YouTube video!

In February of 2026, Peter Knego traveled to Mobile, Alabama to bid farewell to the SS UNITED STATES, which has been undergoing preparation to become the world's largest artificial reef.  Scheduled to be sunk some 22 miles off the coast of Destin, Florida in mid-April of 2026, the famed ocean liner has been cut down to allow clearance once she is on the sea floor.  Her massive funnels and radio mast were carefully removed and are now resting at a secured site some 20 minutes away, hopefully to be part of a museum dedicated to the ship's legacy.  The UNITED STATES at 990 feet was the world's fastest ocean liner, capturing the Blue Ribband on her maiden voyage in July of 1952 at an average speed of 35.59 knots or 40.96 MPH.  She was an engineering marvel, a breathtaking slice of marine architecture and a legend during her 17 years of service.  Laid up ever since, she has been stripped of all interior fittings and after her arrival in Mobile, all of her windows and portholes, hatch covers and various bits of machinery to facilitate her next role under water.  Filmed from outside the yard where the work is being done and from the decks of the Mobile harbor cruise boat PERDIDO QUEEN, this is a touching look at one of America's greatest achievements in her final days.  #ssunitedstates #perdidoqueen #mobile #oceanliner #oldships #classicships

Watch the full video on YouTube!

https://youtu.be/a_lREFHyxRw?si=CiU5liuzsJOA3BBX

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The companion audio to our YouTube video!

This detailed history and top to bottom tour of one of maritime's greatest treasures, the 1907-built SS KEEWATIN, now preserved at the Great Lakes Museum in Kingston, Ontario, covers her story from Scottish shipyard origins to the present day. The last surviving Canadian Pacific liner of a once vast fleet of liners great and small, she is also one of the few ships with an intact quadruple expansion coal fired engine and original interiors that are literally from the same era as LUSITANIA, MAURETANIA and TITANIC. She was saved from the scrappers by being featured in a popular book called "Farewell To Steam", published the year she was sold for scrap but ice delayed her departure to the breakers and a man named RJ Petersen, after reading about her in that book, purchased the still existing ship from the breakers and brought her to his marina in Saugatuck, Michigan where she was lovingly preserved for decades. In recent years, the KEEWATIN has changed hands and since 2023, has been an integral part of the Great Lakes Museum, where she is open for tours each summer. There is nothing like her afloat as you will see in this detailed top-to-bottom tour hosted by Peter Knego, who also visited the ship three times in Michigan over the years. You will hear the voice of Diane Petersen, KEEWATIN's former co-owner, who purchased "Farewell To Steam" for her husband RJ sixty years ago, leading to their salvation of the ship. Also featured with much gratitude is a library of vintage images supplied by "Know Your Ships" author and Great Lakes Ship Historian Roger Lelievre, who took me on our first visit to the ship in 1996. Music licensed from Artlist: Ty Simm "Something New", Tomar Lane "On Ne Sait jamais", Kie Schpigler "Scotland The Brave", Muts Raynard "Ferris Wheel", Pietro Deiro "Success Medley", Kobe Lilian "Lost For WOrds", Louis Adrien "On The Run", Guy Mintus ""Hungarian Dance #5 Reimagined", Jonathan Hadas "Anitra's Dance", Hadasa Atzman "The Swan", Louis Adrien "Waltzing In Paris", Serno "Little Rondo" and 2050 "Interpretation of a Dream" #edwardianliners #keewatin #greatlakesmuseum #quadrupleexpansionsteamengine #preservedliners #classicships #kingston #linktotitanic

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https://youtu.be/H5y55_6Xzfg?si=RFaF99dz-RdeAHOP

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The audio companion to our YouTube video!

Host Peter Knego takes you aboard the QUEEN MARY 2 when she came to Long Beach to "meet" her namesake, the QUEEN MARY in February of 2006 and captures the two ships meeting for a second time from a harbor cruise boat where they actually get much closer to exchange whistle salutes in the gorgeous morning light. Music licensed from Artlist: "Premiere" and "Presto" by Adrien Berengeur. #queenmary #queenmaryship #queenmary2 #cunardline #cunard #oceanliners

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Hosts Dan Trachtenberg and Peter Knego reunite for Episode Seven, the first "A Little Bit Of Ship Banter" podcast of 2026.  They don't hold back about lack of proper planning for the second "Royal Rendezvous" meeting of QUEEN MARY and QUEEN MARY 2 with the photobombing CARNIVAL RADIANCE in the mix and discuss a variety of topics, including the beautifully preserved HIKAWA MARU, the now classic AMBIENCE and so much more.

Videos mentioned in this episode:

Hikawa Maru Decked:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vx6JFw6aCE

A Royal Rendezvous:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1izmqLA5DU

Ambience Decked:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyLv8tj7kQ4

Antarctica with Atlas Ocean Voyages:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5o4hPZuuv4Q&t=5s

Follow us on all our socials and YouTube!

⁠⁠⁠⁠https://linktr.ee/midshipcentury⁠⁠⁠

The audio companion to our YouTube video!

This is a detailed history and top-to-bottom tour of the only surviving ship with a link to the great French Art Deco liners of the late 1920s and early 1930s , the NYK HIKAWA MARU, which was built in 1930 and decorated by preeminent French designer Marc Simon.  HIKAWA MARU is also the only major Japanese liner to survive World War Two, where she served heroically as a hospital ship.  Built for the Asia to Vancouver and Seattle run for NYK, the HIKAWA MARU had two sisters, the HIYE MARU and the HEIAN MARU, both of which were sunk while serving as submarine escorts in World War Two.  In her prime, HIKAWA carried Charlie Chaplin, Prince and Princess Chichibu and other notables on the transpacific run and after the war, continued on that service until retired at the end of 1960.  She was opened up as a museum ship and youth hostel at Yokohama in 1961 and was almost lost in 2006, when her owners could no longer afford to maintain her.  Her former owners, NYK Line, now a major container ship operator (and owner of deluxe NYK Cruises, which operates the former CRYSTAL HARMONY as the ASUKA II) funded her full restoration and reopened her as the NYK HIKAWA MARU in 2008.  In 2024, NYK began conducting tests on the ship's hull and infrastructure and will soon be giving the ship another full restoration to keep her with us for many more years.  All of that and much more can be seen in this 43 minute video.  Music licensed from Artlist:  "Hikaru To SHine" Roie Shpigler; Isshol Together" and "Chevalet" by Idokay; "Tokyo Ondo" by Isaku Kageyama; "Heroes" by Piotr Hummei; "Water Under The Bridge" by OK; "Folkarama" by Slpstrm; "Cou Cou" by Oded Distilman; "Cafe Francais" by Evert Z; "Vacanze a Vaccarro" by Bottega Baltazar; "Aiz u Bandaisan" by Isaku Kageyama; "With You In Montmartre" by Retrophonic and "Feel Inspired" by Ben Fox.  #nykhikawamaru #hikawamaru #hiyemaru #heianmaru #charliechaplin #artdeco #artdecooceanliner #frenchartdeco #marcsimon

The best site for ocean liner ephemera is Nautiques.net, not .com, which I mentioned in the video.  Apologies to Nautiques for our gaffe! 

Also on YouTube at:

https://youtu.be/8vx6JFw6aCE?si=dKK8A8XnYO3xrJsw

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The companion audio to our latest excursion video, also on our YouTube channel!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5o4hPZuuv4Q

This 35 minute video captures the essence of a perfect Antarctica cruise on board ‪@AtlasOceanVoyages‬ M.V. WORLD NAVIGATOR, a 2021-built, state of the art deluxe expedition ship. From zodiac excursions through the ice fields and pods of humpback whales to sea kayaking and hikes through thick snow pack, past penguin colonies and even an abandoned whaling station in the heart of an active volcano, it's all here. Plus the pre-cruise visits to Buenos Aires and Ushuaia and all the activities and dining options on board the ship, itself. Music licensed from Artlist: Marco Martini "Gardens Against Time" and "The Madrigal"; Louis Adrien "The Last Tango"; Dan Zeitune "Lever De La Luna"; Intrex "Wind Of Inspiration"; Marcello Nami "La Grima"; Stephen Beddall "My Heart Is All Yours"; Straight White Teeth "Tell It In A Letter"; Yehezekiel Raz "Flight Of The InnerBird"; Vaceslaw Dragonov "Autumn Pizzicato"; CTRL S "A Female Deer"; Idokay "South"; Amos Ever Hadani "El Tayede Tacuma"; Dani Hadani "Inner Dream"; Marshall Usinger "Beholding". #atlasoceanvoyages #expeditioncruise #antarcticaexploration #antarcticacruise #chinstrappenguins #gentoopenguins #adelepenguins #lemaire

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