No attempt was made to warn the American tank steamer Gulflight, bound for Rouen, France, with a contraband cargo of oil, when she was torpedoed by a German submarine on May 1. The vessel stayed afloat but the wireless operator and one of the sailors, terrified by the shock, jumped overboard and were both drowned, while the captain died of heart failure a few hours later on board the British patrol boat that took off the crew and brought the Gulflight into port.
On the same day that the Gulflight was torpedoed, these two advertisements appeared together in the New York newspapers:
OCEAN STEAMSHIPS.
CUNARD
EUROPE via LIVERPOOL
LUSITANIA
Fastest and Largest Steamer
now in Atlantic Service Sails
SATURDAY, MAY 1, 10 A. M.
| Transylvania, | Fri., | May | 7, | 5 P. M. |
| Orduna, | Tues., | May | 18, | 10 A. M. |
| Tuscania, | Fri., | May | 21, | 5 P. M. |
| LUSITANIA, | Sat., | May | 29, | 10 A. M. |
| Transylvania, | Fri., | June | 4, | 5 P. M. |
Gibraltar—Genoa—Naples—Piraeus
S.S. Carpathia, Thur., May 13, Noon.
ROUND THE WORLD TOURS