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Irish Ferries Rosslare -Pembroke Dock ferry route is currently suspended.

On the operator's sailing updates webpage, the Ireland-Wales route has a warning update.

It reads: "Irish Ferries regrets to advise that the 8.45 Rosslare to Pembroke Blue Star 1 sailing on May 3 has now been cancelled due to ship disruption. You can be accommodated on the Stena Line sailing to Fishguard instead."

The warning is in place on all dates up to May 5 going both ways.

The 'NI Ferry Site blog' reported the Pembroke Dock to Rosslare route was currently not running. The site, which gives updates on the shipping industry, said the reason was that Blue Star 1, the ferry that services the Pembroke Dock to Rosslare route, has been moved to Dublin while W.B Yeats, which serves the Dublin to Cherbourg route, receives maintenance.

NI Ferry Site blog said: "In order to release W.B. Yeats to have a new upper bow door to be fitted, Irish Ferries has moved Blue Star 1 north to take over the Dublin to Cherbourg route.

For further details of the dry-docking at H&W, Belfast, the Western Telegraph reports.

As reported only in mid-March, W.B.Yeats was also in H&W Belfast when the cruiseferry had repairs to the upper car-deck following damage in heavy seas. 

Afloat will have further sailing updates on Irish Ferries fleet movements to reflect the changes on both routes.

Published in Irish Ferries

Esailing & Virtual Sailing information

The concept of e-sailing, or virtual sailing, is based on a computer game sailing challenge that has been around for more than a decade.

The research and development of software over this time means its popularity has taken off to the extent that it has now become a part of the sailing seascape and now allows people to take an 'active part' in some of the most famous regattas across the world such as the Vendée Globe, Route du Rhum, Sydney Hobart, Volvo Ocean Race, America’s Cup and some Olympic venues too, all from the comfort of their armchair.

The most popular model is the 'eSailing World Championship'. It is an annual esports competition, first held in 2018 and officially recognised by World Sailing, the sports governing body.

The eSailing World Championship is a yearly competition for virtual sailors competing on the Virtual Regatta Inshore game.

The contract to run the event was given to a private company, Virtual Regatta that had amassed tens of thousands of sailors playing offshore sailing routing game following major offshore races in real-time.

In April 2020, the company says on its website that it has 35,000 active players and 500,000 regattas sailed.

Virtual Regatta started in 2010 as a small team of passionate designers, engineers, and entrepreneurs gathered around the idea that virtual sailing sports games can mix with real races and real skippers.