00:00 It was built in this very spot. The spot it sits in is the spot it was built. Built by
00:06 Bristolians, loved by Bristolians, admired by Bristolians.
00:10 We're at Brunel's SS Great Britain, or I should really be saying my SS Great Britain.
00:16 Today we're celebrating 180 years of the ship's history. It was built in this very spot.
00:24 The SS Great Britain was designed by the iconic Isambard Kingdom Brunel and was launched in
00:29 1843. 180 years later the SS Great Britain is celebrating her 180th birthday in style
00:37 and reflecting how the ship was coined the greatest experiment since the creation. But
00:42 why is this ship so iconic? Let's find out.
00:45 I volunteer here on a Wednesday. I come and help with the volunteer experience and I also
00:51 do some tours, take the school groups around. So I took a group of year 8s around today.
00:58 Visiting the SS Great Britain is like stepping into a time machine. 180 years ago the ocean
01:04 liner gives visitors the chance to experience what the ship would have been like in the
01:09 1800s. All while paying ode to the brainchild of our most famous honorary Bristolian, Isambard
01:16 Kingdom Brunel.
01:17 Actually it's a really exciting time because today we are celebrating the 180th anniversary
01:24 of the ship's launch and also her 53rd year of being back home in Bristol. So SS Great
01:30 Britain was initially built as a luxury passenger liner and designed by the great Isambard Kingdom
01:36 Brunel, star engineer. She was initially built and launched to take first and second class
01:45 passengers only in luxury from Liverpool to New York. So doing the transatlantic crossing.
01:52 Those would be people who were going on holiday or just doing trade and business and really
02:00 opening communication and trade between Britain and America.
02:05 Well it's obviously historic to Bristol. It's the 180th anniversary today of its launch.
02:11 I think it's very important. It's not just the social history of the ship, of people
02:16 who went to Australia and set sail to Australia and lived over there. But it's also the mechanical
02:22 history of the ship. It's been an iron ship and the first iron hull and a major cruise
02:27 ship to New York. So it's a fantastic experience.
02:32 And in 1939 she was kind of falling apart so the islanders kind of took her out to an
02:37 isolated cove called Sparrow Cove where they were kind of intending her to just kind of
02:42 fall away into nature. But she was rescued by a naval architect called Ewan Corlett
02:48 who kind of drummed up the muster to kind of save this really important piece of maritime
02:53 history. And she was salvaged and brought the 8,000 miles all the way back home to Bristol
03:00 exactly 127 years to the day that she left.
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