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DFDS has made passenger sailings available on Rosslare - Dunkirk until the end of the year.  They are also now taking passenger on VISBORG.

Booking info here @A83 https://www.dfds.com/en/passenger-ferries/ferry-crossings/rosslare-dunkirk

Stena have confirmed that a second passenger vessel will replace Seatruck Panorama on the Rosslare-Cherbourg route from next June.

"Stena Line can confirm that a ropax ferry will be available on the Rosslare-Cherbourg service from late June 2023, operating six days per week, which will help boost travel and accompanied freight capacity. At this point in time Stena Line is not in a position to confirm the exact details of the ship but will advise the market in due course."

https://www.niferry.co.uk/stena-line-takes-delivery-of-second-jumbo-e-flexer-ferry/

Thanks for sharing CCS.

Also worth noting that the sailings are already on sale, though the booking engine has STENA HORIZON in Rosslare and Cherbourg at the same time ;p .

STENA VISION has been linked within the industry for a while though nothing official yet.  She would likely need work to make her more suitable for the crossing and there have been suggestions for instance that her bow door would be welded up to make her a stern loader (perhaps even NORMANDY-style sponsons).  A case of watch this space but it would give Stena the cabin capacity they need during summer and at the end of a day its a ship that is long paid for.

First version is going to Corsica Linea,  nothing really too public on specifics and changes but they do look more modern, details from the fantastic niferry below


https://www.niferry.co.uk/polferries-chooses-visentini-for-next-phase-of-fleet-renewal/

https://www.niferry.co.uk/visentini-floats-out-first-new-generation-ro-pax-for-corsica-linea/


And some other information and images


https://www.shippax.com/en/news/visentini-floats-out-its-largest-ropax-newbuilding-to-date-for-corsica-linea.aspx

https://ferryshippingnews.com/corsica-linea-announces-name-of-lng-newbuilding/

Info on the previous generations

https://www.naos-design.com/staging/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Shippax-Luglio-2019.pdf

From a passenger perspective I'm not sure there will be much change (there's a few renders here thats suggest evolution rather than revolution https://www.corsicalinea.com/vie-a-bord/nos-navires/a-galeotta ).  Tbh they'd probably keep building on the old platform if they could given its success (in fact they did as there were a few keels laid before the rules changes came into effect).

BFE was the reason (what was!) we set up this forum and site, and I'll admit Andy and co were always miles ahead of what I am running here, I'm sorry to see them go.

Actually running a forum (and enthusiasts site), is actually a lot of work, while there has been a move towards Facebook groups, I don't think that's the best place for these discussions (it's difficult to search them, and they tend to block anyone who isn't a member).
There is also the issue as mentioned above where you can have troublemakers and off-topic discussion that can make things messy and difficult to control (or, worse, a defamation case).

Agree with this, though I will say that Facebook groups have their advantages too - there's no way our "Ferries!" Group would be as busy if we had created a forum instead.  Tbh facebooks flakey search is the main issue we have really (leading to duplicate posts, even by the admins sometimes despite checking first).  We are very lucky to have an excellent admin team too, and they are backed up by our regular members who are quick to hit the report button if necessary.  We manually approve all new members though (unlike a lot of groups) which seems to keep things sensible!  If someone does play up we are quick to take action (and ban if necessary).

Regarding websites, it's very easy to underestimate the amount of work that goes in.  I put about 60 hours in one week into niferry a couple of weeks ago and added zero new content in the process, though we do have a slightly different look and things should be running much faster now!  I wouldn't even try to calculate how many hours have gone into the website in total (original content takes a heck of a lot of time), but needless to say it's all unpaid and has to be juggled around other commitments.  As well as a cost in terms of time (and your sanity ) popular websites also have a financial cost.  I don't know exactly how busy BFE was in terms of traffic but good hosting is never cheap (ours has just gone up about 15% too) and cheap hosting doesn't cope assuming, that's assuming they don't pull your account - hence why we had to swallow the bitter pill of running adverts on Niferry.   

TBH I think Andy did incredibly well to keep going for 20 years. 

WB on her way back to Dublin this morning with Stena Nordica en route from Holyhead to Belfast. Meanwhile in Odense all work reported as complete on Inisheer and she is expected to be departing soon for the Channel.

I believe they are only starting on the interior actually!

Looks like WB is about to return to service with the upper deck door plated over. Will obviously have to return to Belfast to have door replaced at some stage.

Great images on this link

https://www.niferry.co.uk/damaged-irish-ferries-ship-undergoes-repairs-in-belfast/?amp

Thanks for the share.  Door may well be fabricated and fitted elsewhere.  I believe it'll be MacGregor who arranges the fabrication as they suppled all the access equipment including ramps and doors to my knowledge.

Travelled on her in October and honestly don't see what people see in her.  BLUE STAR 1, while not perfect, is a much better vessel.   Europe is in need of replacement (which seems very likely given her reliability record despite investment in life extension) or major refurbishment IMHO, despite her crews best efforts.  She's the weak link in the Stena Irish Sea fleet if you ask me!  Stena Nordica (or other) can't come quick enough.

Honfleur has appeared on AIS this morning.

Been on and off (with crazy destination changes) for weeks now.


CAP FINISTERE is to be sold to GNV, reportedly for €45-50m.  SALAMANCA is expected to arrive in Bilbao tomorrow


Link to my NIFS article for anyone interested
https://www.niferry.co.uk/brittany-ferries-agrees-to-sell-cap-finistere/

I think she would need a fair amount spending on her for the ship to fix her up if she were to operate acceptably in Stena's home market.

Best I think can be hoped for is a sale for further service. More likely for scrap as it stands.

But what about the huge investment made by Stena in Europe a couple of years ago she had a massive refit and a huge maintenance programme was carried out,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-u7KKQoq88

Her reliability record since suggests it didn't prolong her life as much as was hoped.  It did get her another couple of (problematic) years though.

She's not in a great state inside either tbh and could do with money spent there.  It's surely hard to justify further investment in an elderly asset on borrowed time.  I imagine she's not the most fuel efficient thing in the world and certainly wouldn't fit with Stena's environmental message going forward!  To run in Scandinavia she's have to burn ultra low sulphur oil (rather than low sulphur) which could also be very problematic for those elderly engines.

The Connemara has been in Bilbao since Wednesday. Any ideas why? She is sailing tomorrow for Rosslare and is full

Weather most likely

Possibly due to the location of the damage and the steel work behind may need to fixed, seem to be some ripples in the bodywork.

Probably needs to be fixed to keep the inspectors happy, and for sailing in stormy weather possibly the best option is drydock and new steels.

The hull was pierced, though because of the nature of the twisted metal on the outside it wasn't really visible

Just seen Epsilon on apollo duck commercial and GRS Ferry and Cruise brokers
https://grs.group/grs-ferry-cruise/purchase/ferry-cruise-vessels-for-sale/ferrycruise-vessels-for-sale-results/ferrycruise-vessels-for-sale-detail/?type=purchase&vid=%231072206

I'd be very cautious- ships actually for sale often don't appear on publicly accessible websites!  Many of these websites advertise vessels speculatively.  In other words they aren't actually for sale, but are advertised as such so if someone bites the third party agent will approach the actual owner and hopefully (for them) get a cut!

On the other hand, C&T could be wanting to sell her on to raise capital, but that doesn't mean any charter would be terminated.  As for the schedules, it would be dangerous to read to much into them at this stage.  They can and do change.  Especially during a global pandemic!  IF schedules, especially EPSILON's, have been very changeable over the past couple of years.

Good to see the construction hall busy again,

Only because of a speculative order from a company associated with the owner though.

One of the new P&O Dover Calais vessels has been floated out at the GSI yard in China, after months of no information on their progress, one vessel appears to be ready for fitting out and the other not far behind.

Images are currently unavailable, but press release due soon with details. In images posted online before being taken down they look very different (obviously) but could be a game changer on the short sea route if they have got the figures right with regards to the hull, power, stabilisation etc.

Spoke to P&O PR directly and they are refusing to comment when asked about a press release when asked a couple of days before we went to press! 

This site just copies what is said in a different group or website and does not bring anything new to us.

🙄.  So we should just make things up without sources (which unlike many we have actually linked to!).

Has there been a strategic and tactical mistake by many players in the industry , including Irish Ferries , in believing that trade would settle back to the landbridge?       Is the whole distribution and supply framework for Ireland not inevitably going to tilt toward direct Ireland -continent ferries ?

Impossible to answer at this stage (though plenty of people seem to have acquired crystal balls in the past 18 months).  It could also be argued that it was a mistake by some to commit so much to direct given how capacity has now dropped.  There were also suggestions that more than one operator was rate dumping, which begs the question, how much money was actually being made by the operators?  A question many of us will never know the answer to I suspect! 

It?s all very well ?filling? a ship and getting the PR (and fully booked isn?t the same as leaving full given the amount of block booking that takes place for freight), but companies are in the business of making money at the end of the day!  Even now it isn?t clear how things will pan out in the coming months.

Given more recent developments, I think it?s pretty obvious what ICG were looking at the ships for!  P&O Ferries? specific denial was that the ships had been sold, NOT that there had been interest (which is what the article actually said).  According to multiple witnesses senior people from Irish Ferries visited the ships.

Question is, did P&O get wind of their plan or did the interest stop for another reason?

Burgundy returns to Dover on Thursday after a while at A&P Falmouth in what is being seen as a response to Irish Ferries.  There have been suggestions from France that Irish Ferries intends to add a second ship in the next couple of months, with a third joining in the new year.

You wait all year for some fabulous interior shots of a ferry and then we get two sets of on board reports in as many days, please see below link to a fantastic image gallery on the Stena Adventurer from the team at NIferry:

https://www.niferry.co.uk/a-look-inside-stena-adventurer-june-2021/?fbclid=IwAR1kDwxP-Q4gENCofmi5IXVzK4lPS18uh1wBzGzIsla8UGblVrb0PT46iMM

We?ve been sitting on these for a while but haven?t had the time to put something together.  I?m also currently working on getting an accurate up to date deck plan as the one onboard doesn?t appear to have been updated yet.