RMS Olympic Ismay had previously planned to build a ship named "Olympic" as a sister ship to . The senior Ismay died in 1899 and the order for the ship was cancelled. Construction of "Olympic" began three months before "Titanic" to ease pressures on the shipyard. Several years would pass before "Britannic" would be launched. In order to accommodate the construction of the class, Harland and Wolff upgraded their facility in Belfast; the most dramatic change was the combining of three slipways into two larger ones. "Olympic" and "Titanic" were constructed side by side. "Olympic"s keel was laid on 16 December 1908
Hecla-class bomb vessel a survey ship, while "Aetna" and "Thunder" were both used as survey ships. "Sulphur" was also used as a survey ship, at one time being commanded by Edward Belcher who later commanded an expedition in search of John Franklin (though not in "Sulphur"). "Erebus" was one of two ships commanded by James Clark Ross during his exploration of Antarctica and by Franklin on his ill-fated search for the Northwest Passage. The other was the "Vesuvius"-class bomb vessel "Terror". Both ships were lost during this last voyage. Hecla-class bomb vessel The "Hecla" class was a class of bomb vessels of the