19621776 Club
Nuclear-powered Savannah leaves Norfolk for her home port
A faulty gauge triggered a reactor shutdown before she even reached Georgia.
Three years after Mamie Eisenhower cracked a bottle across her bow, the NS Savannah finally put to sea under her own power. On August 20, 1962, the world's first nuclear-powered civilian ship departed on her maiden voyage bound for Savannah, Georgia, operated by States Marine Lines. A malfunctioning instrument triggered an automatic reactor shutdown en route, a routine safety response that newspapers ran as a near-disaster. The ship reached Savannah anyway, and Savannah became the first nuclear ship to carry a paying passenger…
