A Russian Designer of SS Normandie – the World’s Largest Transatlantic Liner
Vladimir Yurkevich
June 5 (17), 1885, Moscow, Russian Empire — December 13, 1964, New York, USA
Vladimir Yurkevich (also spelled Yourkevitch, Владимир Иванович Юркевич), was an outstanding Russian naval engineer, one of the principal designers of the famous ocean liner SS Normandie (1931), largest and the most powerful transatlantic passenger vessel in the world. Yurkevich worked in Russia, France and the United States. His name may be rightfully put side by side with such distinguished Russian engineers as Igor Sikorsky, Alexandr de Seversky, Stephen Timoshenko. His creative contribution to the world’s science and technology has been documented in many technical papers in the field of ship construction published in Great Britain, USA, Germany, France and Italy.
In memory of Vladimir Yurkevich we present an article about his invention by a navel expert Vadim Yurchuk and a film about the last hours of SS Normandie that sank in Hudson on February 9, 1942 when it was caught on fire in one of the World War II era’s most astounding disasters.
Who Re-Invented Ship’s Bulbous Bow?
Vadim Yurchuk
In this publication I would love to tell a story of the man who re-invented, calculated and implemented a bulbous vessel’s bow which widely used in the modern shipbuilding today, and about a man who built one of the most beautiful and biggest transatlantic passenger liner in the world. As usual my golden rule: no politics and no nationalities. And also we can always refer to something in the ancient past but “even Archimedes is a quite doubtful inventor of the law of buoyancy if we will be comparing him to Noah…”. (Follow this link to read the full story).