Tag: ferries

Maximise propulsive efficiency, reducing fuel consumption and emissions Three DFDS Seaways ferries are to be upgraded with Rolls-Royce Promas Lite systems to maximise their propulsive efficiency, reducing fuel consumption and emissions.Dover Seaways, Dunkerque Seaways and Delft Seaways serve the Dover- Dunkerque route across the English Channel. The three sisterships were originally designed for a speed of 26.5 knots, and have propellers optimised for that speed. The requirements for the current route are a service speed of 18-19.5 knots, with a few knots more available to recover delays, and responsive manoeuvrability in port. The ferries are equipped with twin screws and two engines per shaft. Normal sailing on the current route can be maintained on one engine per shaft (1+1), with 1+2 and 2+2 available if more power is needed.Rolls-Royce says that under these circumstances a substantial improvement in efficiency could be won by just fitting new blades to the propellers; blades designed to match the present operating profile. But it was decided to go a step further and adopt a Promas Lite solution, so gaining the advantages of new blades plus the additional efficiency improvement from hydrodynamic integration of the propellers and the existing rudders.The conversion work for each vessel ...

Killing at least two people An Indonesian ferry with more than 400 people on board collided with a barge and caught fire Monday, killing at least two, a search and rescue official said.The KM Marina Nusantara, travelling from Surabaya in eastern Java, collided with the barge as it approached the city of Banjarmasin in South Kalimantan province on Indonesian Borneo."The accident happened after 7 am this morning. So far, two people have died. We can't confirm how many are injured, but we are expecting more casualties," said Rusli Ansyah, head of search and rescue in South Kalimantan."The boat was carrying 443 people, some vehicles and other goods. Everyone has now been evacuated and some have been taken to hospital," he said.The Indonesian archipelago of more than 17,000 islands has a poor sea safety record, and fatal accidents are common.Thirteen people were killed when a boat sank Saturday off East Java province, and 25 people were killed off the resort island of Bali when their boat sank last week.Source : AFP

There were more than 1,000 passengers aboard the vessel A senior Zanzibar official said on Monday that the death toll from Tanzania's ferry disaster could rise significantly.The announcement comes after it emerged there were more than 1,000 passengers aboard the vessel when it capsized last week,Initial reports suggested the MV Spice Islander was carrying 800 people, well above the ferry's 600 passenger capacity.:"We were told that the total number of people who were in the boat were a little bit over 1,000 so we are expecting some more bodies between now and maybe tomorrow or day after."More than 600 passengers were rescued from the ferry.The leader of Tanzania's main opposition party CHADEMA, Freeman Mbowe, urges the Zanzibar government to take decisive measures to improve marine transport safety.:"This national tragedy should serve as a timely wake up call to the government that such an accident, which can be avoided, should not happen in the future."Iddi says South African divers are expected on Monday to start searching the wreck of the ferry at the bottom of the Indian Ocean for more bodies.:"We don't expect any survivors unless maybe they managed to escape maybe to Tanga or to Mombasa, but our hope to ...

By refusing to invest in an ageing fleet This weekend the tiny islands of the Zanzibar archipelago made it on to the news pages of newspapers in the west rather than their usual spot in the travel sections. Early on Saturday morning, the MV Spice Islander, a ferry carrying more than 800 people and provisions bound for the island of Pemba capsized, killing nearly 200 people. But what the headlines failed to mention was that this loss of life could have been avoided if the Tanzanian government had chosen to put the interests of its own citizens before those of visiting tourists.The Zanzibar archipelago in Tanzania is made up of two islands, Unguja - or Zanzibar for tourists - and its poorer, less-visited cousin Pemba, to which the MV Spice Islander was travelling. There are only four or five ferries every week to Pemba, most of them are unreliable.Last year I took a trip from the isles to the mainland port of Pemba, not on a ferry but on a small dhow (traditional sailboat) to see how people are forced to take these boats on in the absence of regular ferries, even though it is illegal to ferry passengers on ...

Police are still searching for survivors A legal aid organization is planning to sue Zanzibar's government and others involved for negligence in what is called East Africa's worst maritime disaster in 15 years. Police are still searching for survivors following the sinking of a ferry Saturday in which at least 190 people drowned.Relatives jostle to identify the bodies of their relatives who perished in a ferry tragedy that occurred on its way to Pemba on a picture board at the Maisara grounds in Zanzibar, September 11, 2011.Zanzibar Police Commissioner Mussa Ali Mussa tells VOA police are focusing on the waters between Tanzania's coast and Pemba, one of three islands that comprise the semi-autonomous Zanzibar archipelago."We are using helicopters to survey the whole area from Tanga to Pemba so as to check out whether we have any dead bodies or we have survivors in that area," said Mussa. "The wind moved from the incidence area to that area - from Pemba to Tanga."Commissioner Mussa tells VOA that investigators need to determine the cause of the accident."I think this is very, very early now to draw a conclusion that the incident was due to the overcrowding or overloading or something like that," ...

Hundreds more feared dead The accident happened in deep sea off mainland Tanzania on 10 September at around 1am.It started sinking in an area plagued with heavy currents in the swirling waters.The ferry, M.V. Spice Islanders, was heavily overloaded with 600 passengers with some refusing to board when it was leaving the mainland port of Dar es.Zanzibar Police Commissioner Mussa Alli Mussa said: "Some 260 passengers have so far been rescued."We have recovered several bodies but I can't give you the exact death toll at the moment because the situation is very volatile."Thousands of people massed on the docks of Stone Town on Zanzibar, an island near Pemba, waiting for news.One man was screaming that he had lost 25 members of his family, including his sisters, his wife and grandsons.Many of them said they were furious the ship had been allowed to leave port so overloaded.Rescuer Suleiman Amis, 32, said: "Many of us got here about 2.30 am this morning."We sent out some boats to search for the survivors, but we did not find them until very, very late."We have friends who we know took that boat and we want to go back out to find them as soon as ...

An overloaded boat capsized of the coast of Zanzibar An overloaded boat capsized of the coast of Zanzibar, killing at least 158 people. 521 people have been rescued.

Hopes of finding more survivors were fading following the capsizing of an overloaded passenger Rescue boats, helicopters and divers searched for any remaining survivors but hopes were fading fast of finding anyone alive in the submerged wreck.Zanzibar has vowed to punish those responsible for the overloading of the MV Spice islander ferry, which had more than 800 people on board. Nearly 200 perished when the vessel sank.Mohamed Aboud Mohamed, Zanzibar minister of state, told a news conference that the death toll was 197, with 619 survivors. The ferry was loaded with over 200 more people than it was licensed to carry."The government will take stern measures against those found responsible for this tragedy, in accordance with the country's laws and regulations," he said. "We will not spare anyone."The accident was the worst maritime disaster in the history of Zanzibar, Tanzania's semi-autonomous archipelago and popular tourist destination.In 1996, a Tanzanian ferry sank on Lake Victoria with as many as 1,000 aboard. Only 114 survived.The government charged the captain and eight officials with the murder of 615 people.The Spice Islander began its voyage in Tanzania's commercial capital, Dar es Salaam, where it was loaded with passengers, motor vehicles, bags of food and ...

221 rescued The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) reported on Sunday that 221 passengers and crew were rescued when their interisland ferry ran aground as it neared port in Cebu City in the Visayas.Among those rescued were several ranking government officials as well as Korean and Japanese tourists who were on board the fast craft "Weesam Express 8" on their way from the island province of Bohol to Cebu, said Commander Rolando Punzalan, the chief of the PCG station in Cebu.Punzalan said the ferry left Tagbilaran City in Bohol at 4:30pm on Saturday and was to arrive in Cebu City two hours later at 6:30pm.But 30 minutes before its expected arrival, Punzalan said the PCG received a distress signal from the captain who reported the ferry ran aground near Cebu's neighboring city of Talisay.Among the rescued passengers were Dr. Susana Madarieta, the regional head of the Department of Health; Efren Carreon, the regional chief of the National Economic and Development Authority; and Edward Villarta, the regional head of the National Bureau of Investigation.One of the passengers, who requested anonymity, complained the PCG craft and other vessels arrived late at the scene, resulting in a long delay in the rescue efforts that ...

She survived after falling overboard from a passenger ferry 20 miles off the of East Yorkshire The 23-year-old fell overboard from the Princess Seaways DFDS ferry, which was travelling from Newcastle to Ijmuiden, just after 8.30pm on Monday night.A Sea King rescue helicopter from RAF Leconfield was scrambled and the Scarborough and Filey lifeboat crews were put on standby, but it was the ferry' s own rescue craft which pulled the woman from the water.The crew reversed the ship's course and after 30 minutes in the water, the woman, of Welwyn Garden City, Herts., was brought back onto the boat before being winched on board the helicopter and flown to Scarborough Hospital, where she was checked for hypothermia and kept overnight before being released.Footage of the woman's amazing rescue from the North Sea was captured by the RAF Sea King helicopter.Flight Sergeant Rick Jones from RAF Search and Rescue said the woman was lucky to be alive."To survive the fall, the time in the water and for the ferry to find her and all the assets to be in one place to get one person out such a vast area of the North Sea, she was incredibly lucky," he said.A ...