Cape Race, Newfoundland

Cape Race is a point of land located at the southeastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula on the island of Newfoundland, in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Its name is thought to come from the original Portuguese name for this cape, "Raso", meaning flat or low-lying. The Cape appeared on early sixteenth century maps as Cabo Raso and its name may derive from a cape of the same name at the mouth of the Tagus River in Portugal. The cape was the location of the Cape Race LORAN-C transmitter until the system was decommissioned in 2010. It is also home to the Cape Race Lighthouse, notable for having received the distress call from the RMS ''Titanic''.

Geography

Dense fog, rocky coasts, and its proximity to trans-Atlantic shipping routes have resulted in many shipwrecks near Cape Race over the years. One of the most famous was the . Cape Race is a flat, barren point of land jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean, its cliffs rising almost vertically to above sea level. On average it is shrouded in fog on 158 days of the year.

Climate

History

In 1583, having claimed the port of St John's for Queen Elizabeth I, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, on board the ship ''Squirrel'', and accompanied by the ships ''Golden Hind'' and ''Delight'', passed by Cape Race on his way back to England. ''Squirrel'' would sink en route, taking Gilbert with her.

From 1859 to 1866, the New York City Associated Press kept a newsboat at Cape Race to meet ocean liners passing by on their way from Europe so that news could be telegraphed to New York.(April 1902)
The Great Newspapers of the United States: The New York Evening Newspapers
'' The Bookman (New York)'', p. 160 These news items carried the byline "via Cape Race".
In 1904, the first wireless station in Newfoundland was built at Cape Race. On the night ''Titanic'' sank, wireless operator Jack Phillips was sending telegraphs to Cape Race for relay to New York City. When Cyril Evans, wireless operator of the Leyland Line SS ''Californian'', informed to the RMS ''Titanic'', only a few miles away, that the ship had stopped for the night and was surrounded by icy water. Phillips responded "DDD," meaning that he was transmitting to the Cape Race Marconi Station and to "stop transmitting" as he could not hear the faint signals from Cape Race due to ''Californian''s stronger signal.

Evans soon switched off the wireless and went to sleep at a normal time. Only fifteen minutes later, ''Titanic'' hit an iceberg. Cape Race was also the last land station to pick up ''Titanic''s distress calls. Contrary to belief, Evans was not offended and ''Titanic''s bridge was already aware of ice in the area due to previous ice warnings from other ships. After ''Titanic's'' distress call, Cape Race played a major role in relaying news of the sinking to other ships and land locations.

On September 11, 1990, a Boeing 727 trijet went missing off the coast of Cape Race with 16 people on board. The aircraft was never found.

Marconi's station (MCE) was rebuilt on the same site and opened as a "wireless interpretation centre" to commemorate the 100th anniversary of ''Titanic''s sinking in 2012.

References

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*http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Amerika14April1912.JPG

External links

Cape Race Wireless log at sinking of ''Titanic'' preserved at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic, Halifax

{{coord, 46, 39, 31.2, N, 53, 04, 25.6, W, scale:25000, display=title

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