Pont-Aven Brittany Ferries impressive flagship at the weekend resumed its first Roscoff-Cork round-trip this season, in the 20th anniversary year since its introduction on the Ireland-France route and UK-France/Spain links, writes Jehan Ashmore.

During Pont-Aven’s return leg to France on Friday-Saturday, it was just a day short of its two-decade-old service date of March 24, 2004, which saw the 2,400 passenger, 650 car, and 85 lorry flagship also make its Irish debut the following month on the Ireland-France connection.

The 40,859 gross tonnage flagship with a Breton registry of Morlaix, was built by Meyer Werft, Papenburg, Germany for BAI S.A. (Bretagne-Angleterre-Irlande), trading as Brittany Ferries. Its introduction marked a significant chapter for the company, which has built up its brand and a strong relationship, including culturally with Ireland, for more than 45 years. This began with the Munster-Brittany link launched in 1978.

At the weekend, Pont-Aven’s return crossing from Cork was tracked off Land’s End, Cornwall, England, from where the flagship also made its debut in 2004 in neighbouring Devon on the Plymouth-Roscoff route and the Plymouth-Santander service.

The 10-deck flagship continues to be one of the most luxurious operating to mainland Europe, despite the introduction of Brittany Ferries new chartered tonnage from Stena RoRo’s E-Flexer class. They are spacious, modern, and have more environmental merit, yet they do not compensate for the level of cruise-ferry that Pont-Aven provides.

With a service speed of 23 knots, though capable of 27 knots, Pont-Aven has the capacity to keep to its intensive route network of connecting France-UK-Spain routes and the additional France-Ireland round trips.

Over the winter, a 3m 'duck tail' was added to the stern to improve operational efficiency and environmental benefits, which is expected to achieve a 10% reduction in fuel and save costs. Also on the matter of the environment is when in 2016 was installed 'scrubber’ sulphur emission reduction technology, which is welcomed, though considerably altered the external aesthetics of the original funnel that is shrouded in a cage-like structure, which is somewhat ungainly.

Overall, having said that, Pont-Aven presents a sleek profile to a ship with a pleasant-sounding name, which refers to the small Breton town made synonymous with artists, and this is reflected throughout the flagship’s interior décor - Afloat will have more about such features.

Since 2022, the flagship has been joined by the cruise ferry Armorique, which, coupled with extending the season, offers more sailings and choice to holidaymakers. Also, this season sees a first for Armorique to feature 18 pet-friendly cabins due to surging demand, as until now, dogs have had to remain in cars during the crossing, whereas Pont-Aven already has 28 pet-friendly cabins.

The route complements Brittany’s Rosslare-Cherbourg route and the longer link to Bilbao in northern Spain, for which Afloat consulted the company’s sailing schedules, sees its first ‘outbound’ sailing reinstated tomorrow, 27 March, operated by Santoña.

As for the first ‘inbound’ sailing, this departs Bilbao the following day, 28 March, and is to be served by Galicia. Up until then, the route across the Bay of Biscay was closed to enable port-related infrastructure works, which led to a temporary Ireland-Spain service retaining Rosslare as the Irish port but redirecting the route instead to Santander.

Both of these Ireland-Spain ferries are of the E-Flexer class, in which the company also has Salamanca and two more newbuilds to enter service, though on English Channel routes replacing ageing tonnage.

#MarineScience - Celebrating 20 years of service in July was the Marine Institute's RV Celtic Voyager, the second decade reached marked a significant milestone for Ireland's first purpose built research vessel.

The RV Celtic Voyager was built in the Netherlands and arrived in Ireland in July 1997 to replace the RV Lough Beltra (1978 – 1997) as part of the national strategy to build Ireland's capabilities in marine research. "Moving from the 21m Lough Beltra that had originally been a trawler, to a 31.4m research vessel was the beginning of a new era in marine science in Ireland, where the Institute was able to provide a purpose built platform that could operate further out in our ocean territory. This enabled high quality research and monitoring informing decisions about Ireland's marine resource into the future," explained Mick Gillooly, Director of Ocean Science and Information services, Marine Institute.

The multi-purpose facilities on the vessel has allowed scientists to gather information covering a wide range of ocean sciences, including sea bed mapping and learning more about the marine species and environmental conditions.

Specially fitted with scientific equipment in wet, dry and chemical laboratories, having the ability to carry more scientists and being able to spend more time at sea which increased the output of science in Ireland. The Celtic Voyager, in its first full year of operation reached 260 operational days and the scientific output also increased by 150 percent over the output of the Lough Beltra. The vessel also exceeded original expectations about its range by carrying surveys further south in the Bay of Biscay and as far west as the Rockall Trough.

In the last 20 years, the vessel has successfully completed over 4,800 science days and has sailed over 380,000 nautical miles in the course of 595 science surveys in that period; and has had a positive impact on many Irish marine scientists and crew member's careers at sea.

Ireland's marine territory is over 880,000 square kilometres in the Atlantic, Irish and Celtic Seas, and with the INFOMAR Programme, in partnership with the Geological Survey of Ireland, the Marine Institute is completing one of the largest civilian seabed mapping projects in the world. As part of the INFOMAR programme, the RV Celtic Voyager has been responsible for mapping 30,000 square km Ireland's coastal and inshore area since 2007. Using multi-beam technology on the vessel, scientists have collected data producing high resolution maps showing the shape and type of the seabed below at depths between 20 - ~100m.

"Significant discoveries have been made on the Voyager ranging from mapping over 200 shipwrecks around the coast of Ireland including the RMS Lusitania, RMS Leinster and the Kowloon Bridge to revealing new information about the seafloor. In 2007 the survey of Galway Bay revealed for the first time a detailed seafloor and geology of the bay, confirming the location of the Galway Bay Fault, demarking the limits of Galway's granite landscape running northwest to southeast, between Lettermullan/Gorumna Islands in west Connemara and the Aran Islands," explained Thomas Fury, manager of the advanced mapping team at the Marine Institute.

The RV Celtic Voyager has also played an essential role in fisheries scientific research in Ireland, in particular ground fish stocks such as haddock and whiting since its launch in 1997, as well as developing unique underwater television survey methods to gather information the Dublin Bay prawn (Nephrops norvegicus) since 2002. "The capabilities of the vessel has enabled marine scientists to work in conditions allowing them to better recognise significant changes in the abundance and distribution of a wide range of marine species and changes in the environment; and in turn provide sound scientific advice about information on stock size, exploitation status and catch of commercial species," explained Dr Paul Connolly, Fisheries Ecosystems and Advisory services, Marine Institute.

The RV Celtic Voyager has provided scientists the ability to a learn about the oceans dynamic ecological systems as well as ensuring that Ireland complies with national and EU regulations relating to the assessment of water quality and marine food safety. "Initially the vessel was used for looking at the levels of nutrients and pollutants in coastal waters that were either naturally caused by environmental conditions or introduced by humans such as agriculture run off, shipping and industrial activities," explained Jeff Fisher, Marine Environment and Food Safety Services, Marine Institute.

Surveys over the last decade have however increased the level of research to include the collection and assessment of phytoplankton as an indicator of the health of the ocean; as well as recovering samples of sediments and sea bed organisms for biological, chemical and geological analysis so as to assess at the quality and long term changes to sediment dwelling marine species. In more recent years scientists have also used the Voyager for the collection of water and sediment samples to monitor the impacts of climate change, ocean acidification and the introduction of micro plastics to the marine environment.

Dr Peter Heffernan, CEO of the Marine Institute congratulated the research vessel operations team, crew, scientists and researchers that have worked on the RV Celtic Voyager over the last 20 years, stating that "coastal research and offshore surveys involving fisheries research, environmental monitoring, seabed mapping, oceanographic work, buoy maintenance and student training all highlight the importance of having the best resources available, producing the best marine science in Ireland".

"In the Voyager's 20th year it is therefore important to recognise the contribution the vessel has made in providing marine scientists, researchers and its crew members, with many years of valued experience at sea, expanding and strengthening marine science in Ireland to help inform decisions affecting our ocean. This increase in activity also contributed to the expansion of Ireland's international role and profile in sustainable marine research, development, innovation and management."