The S.S. Noronic’s final voyage ended abruptly at Pier 9.

Flames licked at one of the luxury liner’s aft rooms at about 2:40 a.m. Sept. 17, 1949. The Noronic was docked at Toronto Harbour, with several hundred passengers aboard. Most were from Cleveland or Detroit, but many crewmembers and guests were Canadian.

Within the space of six hours, the entire vessel was “swept from bow to stern and from waterline to mast by fire which roared through it with lightning speed,” the Star reported.

Firefighters and dock workers raced to tackle the blaze. Passengers dived out of cabin windows and off the deck. At least one drowned, and hundreds perished inside the hull. Crewmen had waited 20 minutes before calling for help, believing they could fight the fire on their own.

“I understand the captain stood on the bridge with a hose in his hand fighting the fire until the bridge collapsed under him,” Toronto mayor McCallum told reporters gathered near the Noronic’s berth the following morning.

Despite the hour, rescue workers and volunteers scrambled to the scene, ferrying away the injured and beating back the blaze. “Every Toronto hospital was taxed to capacity as taxis, police cruisers, private cars and ambulances brought the injured in,” the Star reported.

By 8 a.m., the Noronic’s hull was cool enough for firefighters to board. Scores of blackened corpses awaited them. Staff reporter Edwin Feeny claimed to be the first journalist allowed on board. His first-person account was gruesome.

“It was a horrible picture of charred remains amid foot-deep embers and melted glass,” Feeny wrote, after Fire Chief Art Smith escorted him through the Noronic’s remains.

At least 119 people perished in the fire — so many that firefighters ran out of tarps to cover them. The Canadian National Exhibition’s horticultural building was converted into a makeshift morgue. To this day, it’s unclear exactly how many died.

Ontario’s department of transportation organized a coroner’s inquest into the disaster. Investigators found numerous safety deficiencies, among them, a lack of red exit lights for corridors.

However, the fire may not have been the Noronic’s fault. A year later, the RCMP announced an investigation into two men suspected of torching cruise liners, including the Noronic.