B/S GEORGIOS AVEROF
Type: Armored Cruiser
Length: 459.3 feet (140 meters)
Address:
Georgios Averof is the world's only surviving heavily armored cruiser of the early 20th century. During the Balkan Wars in 1912 and 1913, she was the Hellenic Navy fleet flagship during the campaigns in the North and Central Aegean islands, as well as the coastal cities of East Macedonia and Thrace. Greece remained neutral during most of World War I. The Eleutherios Venizelos government in 1917 decided to participate on the Allies' side. At the end of the first World War in November 1918 she sailed to Constantinople and raised the Hellenic flag as one of the winning powers of the Great War. After the signing of the peace treaties Averof with the rest of the fleet moved the Hellenic troops to Asia Minor. She served on the Allied side during World War II, having fled to Egypt and the Indian Ocean with the rest of the fleet. She led the Greek naval force when the fleet dropped anchor in the Faliron Bay, Athens on October 17, 1944. The raising of the ship's war flag in the Athens Acropolis marked the city's liberation. Georgios Averof's last voyage was to Rhodes in May 1947 to commemorate the accession of Dodecanese from Italy. She was towed to her permanent berth in Faliron Bay in 1985, where is now open as a museum. The museum also displays Athenian Trireme Olympias [reconstructed, 1987] and WW II Destroyer HS Velos (D-16) as an anti-dictatorship struggle museum.  Return to the HNSA Home Page.
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