MV Queen of the North was a roll-on/roll-off (RORO) ferry built by AG Weser of Germany and operated by BC Ferries, which ran along an 18-hour route along the British Columbia Coast of Canada between Port Hardy and Prince Rupert, British Columbia, a route also known as the Inside Passage. On March 22, 2006, with 101 people aboard, she failed to make a planned course change, ran aground and sank. Two passengers, whose bodies were never found, died in the incident. The ship had a gross register tonnage of 8,806, and an overall length of 125 metres (410 ft). She had a capacity of 700 passengers and 115 cars.

British Columbia Ferry Services Inc., operating as BC Ferries (BCF), is a former provincial Crown corporation, now operating as an independently managed, publicly owned Canadian company. BC Ferries provides all major passenger and vehicle ferry services for coastal and island communities in the Canadian province of British Columbia. Set up in 1960 to provide a similar service to that provided by the Black Ball Line and the Canadian Pacific Railway, which were affected by job action at the time, BC Ferries has become the largest passenger ferry line in North America, operating a fleet of 41 vessels with a total passenger and crew capacity of over 27,000, serving 47 locations on the B.C. coast.