A ferry on charter from DFDS to Stena Line cancelled its first sailing from Rosslare to Cherbourg yesterday due to technical problems; however, the route is to resume but not until tomorrow, 15 March, writes Jehan Ashmore.
As Afloat previously reported, the chartered Patria Seaways (originally launched as Stena Traveller in 1992) was scheduled to depart Rosslare Europort yesterday at 1800, having caused disruption to customers travelling over the St. Patrick's Day bank holiday weekend.
According to Stena Line’s sailing update, the vessel will depart tomorrow, Saturday (15 March) at 1800 and arrive in Cherbourg on Sunday (16 March) at 1300. The company apologized for any inconvenience this may cause.
The corresponding sailing for today bound for Ireland is cancelled. Instead, Patria Seaways first inbound sailing, according to the Stena Line booking engine, is to take place on St. Patrick’s Day, with an arrival to the ‘Emerald Isle’ on Tuesday, the day after the nationwide event.
The Ireland-France connection has a crossing time of 18 hours, which is routinely operated by Stena Horizon; however, the replacement vessel, Patria Seaways, is offering a limited range of facilities when compared to the Stena Line ropax, the former Celtic Horizon of Celtic Link Ferries, which the Swedish company acquired over a decade ago in March 2014.
When Patria Seaways commences operating tomorrow and up to 14 April, this is to facilitate the dry-docking period of Stena Horizon, which completed a crossing from the continent yesterday afternoon with the disembarking of passengers and vehicles. However, in reality, Afloat understands the ropax during that timeframe will also include covering in for other ferries dry-dockings, as this morning it replaced Stena Estrid on the Dublin-Holyhead route, though the ‘E-Flexer’ at the time of writing remains at anchorage off Dundalk Bay, closer to the Co. Down coastline.
The Ireland-Wales route’s second ship, Stena Adventurer, maintains the route in competition with Irish Ferries Ulysses and Isle of Inisheer. In addition, the near-end wintering of the Dublin Swift is to see the high-speed craft resume seasonal services from mid-April.
As alluded to after Stena Horizon completed its duties at Rosslare yesterday, the ferry headed out to anchor offshore. At around 2000, the ropax made an overnight passage to Dublin Port, where it remained until departing to take up this morning a sailing on the Irish Sea with an arrival at Holyhead completed.
Also yesterday evening, the Patria Seaways saw it vacate its berth to anchor close to Stena Horizon; this was to free up the berth’s linkspan for the Irish Ferries southern corridor route ferry Isle of Innisfree from Pembroke.
The third and only remaining berth was occupied by Finnlines ro-ro freighter Finnwave, which arrived in the early hours of yesterday, having on Tuesday departed from Zeebrugge, Belgium.
