20 October 2004 Exhibit Looks Back at the Empress of Ireland Disaster This photo of the Canadian Pacific's Empress of Ireland shows the transatlantic steamship in all it's former glory before the tragic sinking in May, 1914. Except for the Halifax explosion, the disaster of the Empress is considered Canada's greatest nautical disaster. Former famous and glamourous guests on the ocean liner included the Duke and Duchess of Connaught and Rudyard Kipling. Only Emmy, the ship's cat, escaped the sinking when the crew let her place her paws on land after 96 voyages. Canada's greatest maritime disaster, almost equal to the Titanic's, has largely gone unnoticed by many Canadians.   The Empress of Ireland's nautical grandeur and historical importance were on display last weekend at Revelstoke's Railway Museum thanks to the carefully retrieved articles from the bottom of the St. Lawrence after the steamship's ultimate catastrophe before it had even reached the ocean.   The enormous and ornate ship was one of the Canadian Pacific's great fleet that brought thousands of immigrants from across the Atlantic to this country's shore until 1914, just a few months before the Great War.   The ship was an elegant mode of travel that offered three classes and connected Liverpool to Quebec City where it then linked with the CP's transcontinental railroad.   Because of a dense fog at around 2:00 am on 29 May 1914, the Empress of Ireland collided with the Norwegian collier Storstad that was headed up river and loaded to the waterline. In an account of the disaster, James Croall wrote that the Storstad's bow "had gone between the liner's steel ribs as smoothly as an assassin's knife".   Of the 1,477 on board the Empress that fateful night, 1,012 lost their lives, including 840 passengers, eight more than had died when the Titanic sank. The ship submerged beneath the murky depths in a mere 14 minutes.   Today the Empress of Ireland lies 130 feet below the St. Lawrence surface near Rimouski, PQ. Although the water's frigid temperature deters many divers, much of the artifacts and valuables have been captured and sold to American collectors.   A major reason for the exhibit that will be travelling across the province until it reaches Vancouver, is to garner awareness and hopefully enough interest so that this remarkable and tragic episode in Canadian history might someday see it's artifacts come home and be displayed in the position of honour it deserves.