Flensburger shipyard is beliieved to be the world’s leading builder of ro-ro ship
The first of four small, high-performance freight ferries, designed and built for tough Irish Sea operation with UK operator Seatruck, was being named and launched on 19 August at the Flensburger shipyard.
For delivery in November, the 5,255dwt/18,920gt Seatruck Progress has been built by Flensburger Schiffbau-Gesellschaft (FSG) in Germany, which claims to be the world’s leading builder of ro-ro ships. She is the smallest ship type built by the yard since it began specialising in ro-ros in the late 1990s and the first of four sisters being delivered to Seatruck between November this year and June 2012.
The 142m long and 25m wide newbuilds boast 2,166 lane metres on four decks and can also carry up to 151 trailers. They are driven by two MAN 7L48/60CR main engines of 2 x 8,000kW providing 21 knots and are still capable of meeting rigorous emission and fuel consumption demands, according to FSG managing director Peter Sierk.
Seatruck Progress is the most modern and efficient ship to join the Seatruck fleet and although the smallest from FSG will be the biggest to operate out of the small English port of Heysham. The size of the port determined the length of the new ships, which allows for the greatest possible load and optimal manoeuvrability in limited space. That is the reason for the deckhouse location forward – to guarantee unhampered loading of the upper decks.
“Building four ships one after another for a single customer has not been an everyday occurrence in the history of our shipyard”, said Sierk. “Because limits will get even lower over the next few years, our aim first and foremost is to deliver ships which already meet the standards the future will demand”. That meant not only emission levels, but also fuel consumption with FSG ships consuming up to 30% less fuel than conventional ships, Sierk said.
Sierk said FSG, which usually builds ships of around 200m, had entered new territory with the Seatruck ferries. “We are expanding our portfolio by adding smaller but otherwise extremely efficient ships. In this way we will be even more attractive to many customers on a keenly contested global market”, he said.
FSG is one of only very few German yards which boast work in hand into 2013. Apart from the Seatruck ferries it also has orders for three more freight ferries for regular customer Ulusoy Sealines in Turkey and says further orders “are in the planning stage”
Source: The Motorship