Queen Elizabeth 2 (ship)

The Queen Elizabeth 2, generally known as the QE2, was a Cunard Line ocean liner and cruise ship completed in 1969 to succeed the aging RMS Queen Mary and RMS Queen Elizabeth on the North Atlantic run between Southampton and New York. Built with steam turbine propulsion later replaced by diesel-electric machinery in a major 1986 refit, she combined liner-speed transatlantic crossings with a growing schedule of round-the-world cruises as jet aircraft took over most ocean passenger traffic. Over a career of nearly four decades she became one of the best-known ocean liners in the world, serving briefly as a troop transport during the 1982 Falklands conflict before returning to civilian service, and she was retired from Cunard service in 2008.