RMS Lusitania Sinking of the RMS Lusitania. RMS Lusitania RMS "Lusitania" was a British ocean liner and briefly the world's largest passenger ship. The ship was sunk on 7 May 1915 by a German U-boat off the southern coast of Ireland. The sinking presaged the United States declaration of war on Germany in 1917. The ship was a holder of the Blue Riband appellation for the fastest Atlantic crossing and was briefly the world's largest passenger ship until the completion of her sister ship . The Cunard Line launched "Lusitania" in 1906, at a time of fierce competition for the North Atlantic
U-boat Campaign (World War I) operations. One of the ships sunk near the Norwegian coast was the Romanian merchant "Bistrița", sunk by "U-43" on 11 November. Before sinking the ship, the captain of the U-boat allowed the ship's crew to take refuge in his submarine, then later he handed over the crew to a Russian sailing ship which took them to Vardø. From there, they were eventually repatriated. The Constantinople Flotilla was established in May 1915 and operated U-boats in the Black Sea. Bulgaria joined the campaign in May 1916, when the German submarine "UB-8" was commissioned by the Bulgarian Navy as "Podvodnik". In three