<Tr> <Td_colspan="2"> In the 1972 film the SS Poseidon is based on the RMS Queen Mary . </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Th> Type </Th> <Td> Ocean liner </Td> </Tr> <P> The S.S. Poseidon is a fictional transatlantic express liner that first appeared in the 1969 novel The Poseidon Adventure by Paul Gallico and later in four films based on the novel . The ship is named after the god of the seas in Greek mythology . </P> <P> In the 1969 novel, the ship is traveling across the Atlantic on her first month - long cruise with African and South American ports of call, after her recent sale & conversion from the 35 - year old British ocean liner RMS Atlantis into the American cruise ship that she is now . On December 26, the Poseidon capsizes when a landslide in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge produces a massive 99 - foot tsunami . The description of the ship is slim, Gallico described her as a quadruple - screw ocean liner of 81,000 tons, as long as four city blocks, and as high as an apartment building with three massive funnels . He also described her fatal flaw as riding high in the water, improperly ballasted and technically unseaworthy, this, he wrote, made Poseidon vulnerable to capsizing in heavy seas . </P>

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