Together with her main competitor and running mate, the MS Oranje of the Netherland Line, she became a popular fixture on the Dutch East Indies route.

The future prime minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, travelled aboard Willem Ruys as a fresh graduate upon completing his studies in the United Kingdom.

During the (later heavily criticized) abrupt and fast approach of Oranje, Willem Ruys made an unexpected swing to the left, resulting in a collision.

The voyage is documented in Journey to Java, his published journal of the trip,[4] which provides a detailed account of first class travel on the vessel in the 1950s interlarded with rambling literary reflections.

Then, from 20 September 1958, until 25 February 1959, she underwent a major facelift at the Wilton-Fijenoord shipyard in Amsterdam, turning her from a passenger liner into a cruise ship.

The Royal Dutch Mail Ships (Willem Ruys, Johan van Oldenbarnevelt and Oranje) became a popular alternative to the British liners.

The ship played a role in evacuating the families of British servicemen caught up in unrest in Aden, and made one of the last northbound transits through the Suez Canal before its closure during the Six-Day War.

The ship was chartered by a private group for the duration of the 1987 America's Cup series held in Fremantle, Western Australia, to act as a viewing platform and accommodation for 1,400 visitors.

On 7 October 1985, four members of the Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) took control of the liner off Egypt as she was sailing from Alexandria to Port Said.

Holding the passengers and crew hostage, they directed the vessel to sail to Tartus, Syria, and demanded the release of 50 Palestinians then in Israeli prisons.

After being refused permission to dock at Tartus, the hijackers killed disabled Jewish-American passenger Leon Klinghoffer and then threw his body overboard.

[5] The ship then headed back towards Port Said, and after two days of negotiations, the hijackers agreed to abandon the liner in exchange for safe conduct and were flown towards Tunisia aboard an Egyptian commercial airliner.

The four terrorists were ultimately sentenced to prison terms by the Italian courts, while the operation's mastermind, who had not taken part in the actual hijacking, was given passage to Yugoslavia and escaped.

In the evening of 30 November 1994 she caught fire off the coast of Somalia while en route to South Africa, with 979 passengers and crew aboard.

Entertainer Moss Hills, who led rescue efforts during the sinking of MTS Oceanos in 1991, recalled that pouring water on an oil fire was ineffective, while making the conflagration worse.

A small number of crew and passengers were unable to board the main lifeboats due to flames coming up from the hull, so they climbed down a rope ladder from the stern to reach inflatable boats.