For the filming of The Bounty, a replica of William Bligh's ship, was required. The Bounty replica was built by Whangarei Engineering Company at Whangarei, New Zealand during 1978 and 1979. The ship was designed to externally conform to the original Bounty. The replica is in length overall, with a beam of and a draught of. To reflect the international legacy of the Mutiny on the Bounty, materials for the ship were sourced from across the British Commonwealth. The hull was fabricated from Australian steel, which was carvel-clad in New Zealandiroko. The decking is New Zealand tanekaha. The masts and spars were made of Canadian pine, with sails made from Scottish flax, and blocks of English ash and elm. The sail plan was of a barque: some sources describe the layout as a full-rigged ship, but the ship lacks a topgallant on the mizzen-mast. The ship's mast height is, with a sail area of. Auxiliary propulsion is provided by two turbocharged Kelvin 8-cylinder diesel engines, which can propel the ship at.
History
The film The Bounty was completed and released in 1984. Bounty was laid up in Los Angeles until 1986, when Bounty Voyages purchased the ship. She was sailed to Vancouver, refitted, then sailed to Australia. From here, she proceeded to England via the Suez Canal to join the First Fleet Re-enactment Voyage: a historical re-enactment for the Australian Bicentenary. She left England for Australia in May 1987, and sailed with the fleet via Tenerife, Rio de Janeiro, Cape Town, Mauritius, and Fremantle before arriving in Sydney on Australia Day 1988. Bounty was originally to be flagship of the re-creation voyage, but the fleet commodore instead selected Søren Larsen for the role. For many years she served the tourist excursion market from Darling Harbour, Sydney, Australia, before being sold to real estate conglomerate HKR International Limited in October 2007. The company gave The Bounty an additional name in Chinese, 濟民號 after company founder Cha Chi Ming. For the following decade, the ship was used as a tourist attraction in Discovery Bay, on Lantau Island in Hong Kong, where it was used for harbour cruises, charters, day excursions, weddings and corporate retreats . Finally, with no publicity or explanation, HKRI decommissioned The Bounty on 1 August 2017. The company has not disclosed the ship's fate.
