Page 57 - Michael Frost-Voyages to Maturity-23531.indd

But that did not much matter to me. Two days out of Colombo, Young and
I were informed that we were to leave the ship in Port Swettenham (now Port
Klang) and join Mantua, a tanker presently bound for Singapore. P&O itself
(apart from subsidiaries) owned four tankers at that time, but I had never come
across anyone who knew anything about working on this type of vessel. We were,
however, going into this venture ‘cold’; two of the cadets presently on the vessel
had been caught selling some of the ship’s fire-gear (unwise on any ship, but on a
tanker!) to some local ‘entrepreneurs’. We were simply to join as soon as we could;
the recalcitrant cadets, it need not be said, were to be flown back to UK as soon as
the ship docked, their sea-going career thereafter unlikely to be extensive.

Arrival in Penang was somewhat anti-climactic; Mantua was still at sea. On
July 17th, we arrived in Port Swettenham (not much of a place, actually, though
it subsequently became Malaysia’s biggest port) and were whisked ashore by the
local P&O agent. I was not unhappy to leave Khyber; in its personnel, it was a pretty
easy-going ship but far from a comfortable one. And I had had enough hot and
sleepless nights in a small and stuffy cabin. So, I looked back without nostalgia; I
never saw her again, the ship reputedly being scrapped a few months later.

*********

It is opportune to refer to three significant matters that were to profoundly
affect the world of shipping but which at the time received little of the notice
that they deserved.

The first occurred in 1956 when the Ideal X set sail. This, the world’s first con-
tainer ship, effected a revolution in cargo transportation that was of a significance
not then apparent. Time and prosperity had boosted the world’s trade to such
effect that the world of freighters was, to those who could see it, an anachronism,
unnecessary days being spent in port, the acquisition of qualified crews daily
growing more difficult and the wastage to cargoes becoming matters of major
concern. Khyber was a manifestation of that obsolescence; a new day had dawned.

Then in 1957, the Boeing 707 commenced to operate. Almost instantly the
world’s passenger fleets saw their livelihood evaporate, in particular Cunard Line
and P&O. The process took time, but it was inevitable. Though slow (envisaging
new types of ships, designing, and then constructing them could not be rushed),
once commenced, the revolution accelerated. Queen Mary and Canberra rapidly
became white elephants.

Thirdly, equally significant was the US Jones Act (of 1920). This legislation,
designed to maintain the dominance of the US merchant marine by requiring
trade between US ports to be carried in American ships that had to be manned by
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