Pacific Mail first used the Cuba to carry passengers and cargo between San Francisco, California, and Havana, Cuba, then shifted to a San Francisco-to-Cristobal route.
On the morning of September 8, 1923, Cuba struck a reef just off San Miguel Island in the Santa Barbara Channel off the coast of California. All aboard survived and were rescued, but the Cuba was a total loss.
The ship's radio was out. She had been navigating through a dense fog for several days.
Later that day, nine US Navy destroyers ran aground nearby in the Honda Point Disaster.
See SS Cuba for other steamships of this name.
External link
Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary (http://www.channelislands.noaa.gov/shipwreck/dbase/cinms/cuba1.html)
The Cuba was a steamship owned by the Pacific Mail Steamship Company.
Originally launched in 1897 as the German Coblenz, she was seized by the United States in 1917, and named Sachem, until Pacific Mail purchased her from the Shipping Board on February 6, 1920 for US$400,000.
Pacific Mail first used the Cuba to carry passengers and cargo between San Francisco, California, and Havana, Cuba, then shifted to a San Francisco-to-Cristobal route.
In August 7,000 men were landed in Vladivostok and remained until January 1920, as part of an allied occupation force.
President Kennedy instituted a "quarantine" on the shipment of offensive missiles to Cuba from the Soviet Union.
On May 15, 1975, President Ford reported he had ordered military forces to retake the SS Mayaguez, a merchant vessel en route from Hong Kong to Thailand with U.S. citizen crew which was seized from Cambodian naval patrol boats in international waters and forced to proceed to a nearby island.