Isambard Kingdom Brunel, a visionary engineer who changed the history of shipbuilding

We agree that the full maturity of the iron shipbuilding was achieved with the SS Great Britain, designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806 - 1859) and launched in 1843. But there is an antecedent. In 1835 Brunel started his first incredible undertaking: the construction of the SS Great Western, the ship that made the first Atlantic crossing with steam-powered propulsion in 1838, and until 1839 the largest passenger ship in the world. An iron monster, framed by a cloud of white floating sails, a riveted mountain of iron, a floating volcano that emitted an infernal black smoke fueled by its 10 powerful boilers like 100 furnaces: this was the new luxury transatlantic of the new Victorian age. It was an era where the new materials, cast iron, iron and steel prevailed; an era characterized by shiny brass, glowing irons, steam engines that emitted puffs, whistles and hisses and where nothing, seemed to be impossible: every engineering challenge was faced and won. And the greatest Victorian engineer was a rather small man with very big dreams: Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Brunel was about a meter and a half tall, he was not a surprising figure, but what he lacked in height was strongly offset by enormous design and entrepreneurial skills: “he was the most intense man in the business, the greatest artist ever to work in iron”. But his most important contribution to shipbuilding was the design and construction of the SS Great Eastern (1854). This was another important step in the history of shipbuilding. These ships were the image of the new that advanced with giant steps. In this short note we want to tell how the ideas of a visionary engineer of the nineteenth century have turned into reality, and how this reality has changed forever the way to go by sea.