Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Displaying items by tag: Irish Sea Shipping Line 2014

#SeatruckAward- Seatruck Ferries was voted Irish Sea Shipping Line of 2014 at the annual Export & Freight Transport & Logistics Awards held in Belfast recently.

This was the second year in succession that the ro-ro freight company was presented with the much coveted award, sponsored by DSV.

A selected group of hauliers were asked to anonymously pick one service which offered the optimum level of service, quality, on-board facilities and choice of routes, registered their votes via a totally secure and carefully policed on-line 'one customer one vote' system.

Those attending the awards ceremony held in the Ramada Hotel heard that "Seatruck has truly stretched the boundaries of traditional shipping services. It remains the only Irish Sea operator solely focused on the transportation of unaccompanied freight."

Among the developments of the operator this year was the replacing in April of Arrow on the Dublin-Heysham route by the much larger  "P" series vessel, Seatruck Pace which as previously reported, Afloat.ie interviewed one of her masters.

The vessel's introduction bringing speed, schedule reliability and additional capacity are factors in which the operator confirmed strategic importance to the route.

On the Dublin-Liverpool service, a refit to all freight passenger twin-berth cabins were carried out on the pair of FSG vessels Seatruck Power and Seatruck Progress.

 

Published in Ferry

Dublin Bay Sailing Club Turkey Shoot Winter Series

Dublin Bay Sailing Club's Turkey Shoot Series reached its 20th year in 2020.

The popular yacht series racing provides winter-racing for all the sailing clubs on the southside of Dublin Bay in the run-up to Christmas.

It regularly attracts a fleet of up to 70 boats of different shapes and sizes from all four yachts clubs at Dun Laoghaire: The National Yacht Club, The Royal St. George Yacht Club, The Royal Irish Yacht Club and the Dun Laoghaire Motor Yacht Club as well as other clubs such as Sailing in Dublin. Typically the event is hosted by each club in rotation.

The series has a short, sharp format for racing that starts at approximately 10 am and concludes around noon. The event was the brainchild of former DBSC Commodore Fintan Cairns to give the club year-round racing on the Bay thanks to the arrival of the marina at Dun Laoghaire in 2001. Cairns, an IRC racer himself, continues to run the series each winter.

Typically, racing features separate starts for different cruiser-racers but in fact, any type of boat is allowed to participate, even those yachts that do not normally race are encouraged to do so.

Turkey Shoot results are calculated under a modified ECHO handicap system and there can be a fun aspect to some of the scoring in keeping with the Christmas spirit of the occasion.

As a result, the Turkey Shoot often receives entries from boats as large as Beneteau 50 footers and one designs as small as 20-foot flying Fifteens, all competing over the same course.

It also has legendary weekly prizegivings in the host waterfront yacht clubs immediately after racing. There are fun prizes and overall prizes based on series results.

Regular updates and DBSC Turkey Shoot Results are published on Afloat each week as the series progresses.

FAQs

Cruisers, cruising boats, one-designs and boats that do not normally race are very welcome. Boats range in size from ocean-going cruisers at 60 and 60 feet right down to small one-design keelboats such as 20-foot Flying Fifteens. A listing of boats for different starts is announced on Channel 74 before racing each week.

Each winter from the first Sunday in November until the last week before Christmas.

Usually no more than two hours. The racecourse time limit is 12.30 hours.

Between six and eight with one or two discards applied.

Racing is organised by Dublin Bay Sailing Club and the Series is rotated across different waterfront yacht clubs for the popular after race party and prizegiving. The waterfront clubs are National Yacht Club (NYC), Royal Irish Yacht Club (RIYC), Royal St George Yacht Club (RSGYC) and Dun Laoghaire Motor Yacht Club (DMYC).

© Afloat 2020