RMS LUSITANIA is best remembered today for the controversy surrounding her loss as the result of a German submarine attack on Friday 7th May, 1915, during the First World War. But this book also tells of her life before that cataclysmic event: the ground-breaking advances in maritime engineering that she represented, her hitherto unheard-of degree of opulence, and her seven glorious years of peacetime service - including her capture of the coveted Blue Riband award for Great Britain. Here, three members of the Lusitania Historical Society take a close and authoritative look at the disaster which befell her, and attempt to determine why this magnificent vessel, together with over a thousand souls, was lost in a mere eighteen minutes ...