1916 Nov 21.HMHS Britannic hits a mine and sinks.

HMHS Britannic

For other White Star liners with the same name, see SS Britannic (1874) and MV Britannic (1929).

Not to be confused with RMS Britannia.HMHS Britannic was the third and largest Olympic-class ocean liner of the White Star Line. She was the sister ship ofRMS Olympic and RMS Titanic, and was intended to enter service as the transatlantic passenger liner, RMS Britannic. The White Star Line used Britannic as the name of two other ships: SSBritannic (1874), holder of the Blue Riband and MV Britannic(1929), a motor liner, owned by White Star and then Cunard, scrapped in 1960.

His Majesty's Hospital Ship Britannic
Career
Name:	HMHS Britannic
Owner:	White Star Line
Operator:	Royal Navy
Port of registry:	Liverpool, United Kingdom
Builder:	Harland and Wolff, Belfast
Yard number:	433
Laid down:	30 November 1911
Launched:	26 February 1914
Completed:	12 December 1915
In service:	23 December 1915 (hospital ship)
Out of service:	21 November 1916
Fate:	Sunk by a mine or torpedo on 21 November 1916 near Kea in the Aegean Sea. 30 fatalities.
Status:	Wreck
General characteristics
Class & type:	Olympic-class ocean liner
Tonnage:	48,158 gross register tons
Displacement:	53,200 tons
Length:	882 ft 9 in (269.06 m)
Beam:	94 ft (28.7 m)
Height:	175 ft (53 m) from the keel to the top of the funnels
Draught:	34 ft 7 in (10.5 m)
Depth:	64 ft 6 in
Decks:	9
Installed power:	24 double-ended, 5 single-ended (coal-fired) boilers Two four-cylinder triple-expansion reciprocating engines, each producing 16,000 hp (12,000 kW) for outboard wing propellers, one low-pressure turbine producing 18,000 hp (13,000 kW) for the centre propeller Total 50,000 hp (37,000 kW)
Propulsion:	Two bronze triple-blade outboard wing propellers One bronze quadruple-blade central propeller
Speed:	21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph) 23 knots (43 km/h; 26 mph) (maximum)
Capacity:	675 as hospital ship (300 wounded, 489 medical staff)
Crew:	860
Notes:	Carried no civilian passengers; 1,066 on board at time of sinking

She was launched just before the start of the First World War and was laid up at her builders in Belfast for many months before being put to use as a hospital shipin 1915. She was shaken by an explosion, caused by anunderwater mine, in the Kea Channel off the Greek island ofKea on the morning of 21 November 1916, and sank 55 minutes later, killing 30 people.

There were 1,066 people on board, with 1,036 survivors 

taken from the water and lifeboats; roughly an hour later, at 9:07 AM, the ship sank. In spite of Britannic-being the biggest

ship lost in the First World War, her sinking didn't kill as many people as the sinking of RMS Titanic or of Cunard's RMS 

Lusitania, or many other ships lost in the War