In 1981 she made her appearance in the classic British TV soap opera, Crossroads, when the main character Meg Mortimer was written out, supposedly dying in a fire, but instead was sailing to a new life in New York. The lights were so hot they turned the sprinklers on. Cunard were not happy at the thought of all those ruined carpets. She also doubled as the Queen Mary in the Granada TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited the same year, filming in the mid-Atlantic.
She was called up for war duty in 1982 when Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. Her campaign there is often exaggerated while Canberra and others are overlooked. She wasn't a real war heroine like Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth criss-crossing the Atlantic for six years in danger every time. Or even Aquitania, which served in both World Wars, her reliability astounding everyone during WWII. After QE2 arrived back in Southampton on the 3rd May and a conversion which took nine days as opposed to Canberra's three, she finally set sail in the 12th by which time Canberra had been gone thirty-three days. She spend eight days there transferring her troops to Canberra to take to the front line, her main threat being icebergs rather than Argentinian missiles, before returning home on the 11th June with injured servicemen while Canberra didn't return for another thirty days, being troop carrier, hospital ship and returning POWs to Argentina so was the true heroine. While Canberra was affectionately called The Great White Whale, QE2 received the unfortunate nickname The Black Pig. When the troops finally returned in July to a hero's welcome in Southampton, several had banners saying: Canberra cruises where QE2 refuses. As much as people love QE2, her war record wasn't in the same league as her illustrious predecessors or Canberra.
After the Falklands she returned to normal service on the 14th August but for some reason they decided to paint her hull grey while her funnel returned to normal Cunard colours. It was not popular so they returned to normal colours a year later, leaving the funnel.
She lost her tall, thin look in 1986 when from November 1986 to April 1987 she underwent a radical overhaul at Lloyd-Werft in Bremerhaven to convert her from traditional steam engines to diesel and was increased to her current 70,327grt. She looked odd with her fatter funnel but after getting used to it looked odder without it.
The first photo is the oldest known I have. It shows my late great-grandparents Henry and Rose Stapley on board in the Queens Room but I'm unsure of the year or whether it was a cruise or visit as it's the only one we have and my parents can't remember. It was sometime between her entering service in 1969 and my family moving from Kent in 1972 while my great-grandparents remained there until their deaths in 1974.
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Updated 18th November 2008