SV Mandalay is a three-masted schooner measuring 163.75 ft (49.91 m) pp,[2] with a wrought iron hull. It was built as the private yacht Hussar (IV), and would later become the research vesselVema, one of the world's most productive oceanographic research vessels. The ship currently sails as the cruising yachtMandalay in the Caribbean.[2]
In the late 1920s the Huttons decided they wanted a larger yacht, so they commissioned the construction of the Hussar (V) (later Sea Cloud). The Hussar IV was put up for sale in September 1930,[9] and eventually sold to Norwegian shipping magnate, G. Unger Vetlesen and his wife Maude Monell and renamed Vema, a combination of Vetlesen and Maude.
U.S. WWII Service
Vema during World War II with Merchant Marine traineesTrainees aboard Vema, July 1942[10]
During World War II, Maude Monell donated Vema to the American war effort. The vessel was put into service as a barracks and training ship for United States Merchant Marine cadets,[11] deployed patrolling coastal waters for the United States Coast Guard.[1] Assigned to the US Maritime Service Training Station on Hoffman Island, her sailing area was listed as 14,000 sqf.[12] After the war she was abandoned off Staten Island until Louis Kenedy, a captain from Nova Scotia, salvaged the vessel.[1][13] LDEO leased the vessel in 1953 and soon bought her for $100,000.[1]
Research vessel Vema
Vema fracture zone
Vema started circling the globe as the first of the Lamont Geological Observatory research vessels (now the Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory [LDEO]), a research unit of Columbia University. Displaying a black hull, she was used to collect samples of seawater and sediment cores, measure currents and heat flows, perform underwater photography and seismic studies, and map out ocean floors. The work on the ship helped to confirm the continental drift theory. By the time of her retirement in 1981, the Vema had collected data on a record track of 1,225,000 nautical miles (2,269,000 km).[1] Notable scientists who worked aboard the Vema include Maurice Ewing, Bruce C. Heezen, Ralph (Ralphy) Roessler, J. Lamar Worzel,[14]Jack Nafe, Frank Press, and Walter Pitman, all of whose work was greatly facilitated by Marine Technical Coordinator Robert Gerard, who was responsible for the fitting and refitting of LDEO marine research vessels from the Vema through her successors, the Conrad, Eltanin, and RV Maurice Ewing, including the design and installation of numerous pieces of customized scientific measurement equipment critical to their research.
The ship was refitted again as a cruising yacht for the Caribbean under the name SV Mandalay (also Mandalay of Tortola)[2] with a sail area of > 20,000 square feet (1,900 m2).[3] The ship was operated by Windjammer Barefoot Cruises from 1982 until the operator went out of business in 2008.[20]Mandalay subsequently was purchased at auction, refurbished, and used as specialty cruise ship in the Galapagos islands off Ecuador by Angermeyer Cruises.
The Mandalay later sailed weekly out of Grenada for one and two-week cruises in the Grenadines for Sail Windjammer, Inc.[21] However, Sail Windjammer announced in early 2021 that the company would be ceasing operations due to the financial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and damage to Mandalay.[22]
