On October 14, the Port of Santos celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Igara Launch, on display at the Port Museum since its inauguration in 1989, having been in service at the Port of Santos between 1926 and 1980.
The 20-passenger launch was built in England by the I. S. Thornycroft-Southampton shipyard. Its arrival at the Port of Santos currently has several versions. One of them states that the Igara was donated by the British government.
The other version tells an episode of the Guinle family. The launch would have been donated by Oscar Coxs (founder and former president of Fluminense, a football club in Rio de Janeiro) to Arnaldo Guinle (counselor of the Rio club) and brother of Guilherme Guinle (director of CDS between 1925 and 1961).
Cox in 1926, as a thank you for the Guinle family's contributions to the construction of the main grandstand at Laranjeiras, the old stadium and current headquarters of the Rio club, would have donated the vessel to Arnaldo. Currently, Arnaldo Guinle has tributes at the headquarters and is considered a patron of the Rio club.
Despite these historical accounts, the identity of the donor and the exact circumstances of its transfer still require primary documentation.
The Igara, while in service of CDS (Companhia Docas de Santos), served as a vessel for technical visits and was mainly responsible for navigating with the port board on board.
The launch also played a part in significant events at the Port of Santos, such as the reception of the historic seaplane Jahu, the first with a Brazilian crew to cross the Atlantic Ocean.
The mastermind of the adventure, young João Ribeiro de Barros, a descendant of coffee barons from the Jaú region, São Paulo interior, accompanied by Vasco Cinquini (mechanic), Newton Braga (captain), and young fighter pilot Arthur Cunha (lieutenant), took off from Genoa on October 13, 1926.
The heroes, crew members of the Jahu, after a long nine and a half months journey, at 1:00 PM on July 28, 1927, landed with great celebration at the Estuary pier, near Barnabé Island, and were taken by the Igara to the Customs pier, where they were received with a shower of flowers and applause.
Over the years, the vessel became an object of appreciation for José de Menezes Berenguer, Chief Engineer of CDS between 1946 and 1980. His great dedication and commitment to the preservation of the Igara make Berenguer a remarkable character in the launch's history.
Intimately linked to the trajectory of the Port of Santos, the Igara constitutes an important period of Brazilian maritime and port memory. It is currently a historical collection and tourist attraction at the Port Museum.
With Berenguer's intense work and the various revitalizations carried out on the vessel, the last one during the Museum's 35th-anniversary celebrations in 2024, it was possible to preserve this chapter of port history, reaching the 100-year mark today.
Service
The Port of Santos Museum is open from Monday to Saturday, from 9 AM to 5 PM, at Avenida Conselheiro Rodrigues Alves, s/nº, corner of Rua Conselheiro João Alfredo, in the Macuco neighborhood, in Santos.
