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Displaying items by tag: WB Yeats relief ferry

Irish Ferries main vessel on the Dublin-Holyhead route, Ulysses is receiving an annual overhaul but for the first time at A&P Tyne on the North Sea, which has the largest dry-dock on the east coast of England, writes Jehan Ashmore.

The 2001 Aker Finnyards built cruise-ferry of 50,398 gross tonnes is undergoing the dry-docking at one of the three facilities that form the A&P Group, the others been located at Tees and Falmouth.

When combined the facilities have seven dry-docks in the Group which is part of the wider APCL Group of shipbuilders and shiprepairers, among them Cammell Laird, Birkenhead on the west coast (as reported yesterday). In recent year's collaboration has seen A&P Tyne fabricate modular blocks for the UK's polar research vessel, RRS Sir David Attenborough which was launched from the Merseyside shipyard.

As for the dry-dock programme of the 209m Ulysses, the cruise-ferry which arrived in the first week of this month, Afloat has tracked to the 236m Dry-Dock downriver of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

Among the works, is the overhaul of the main engine starboard gearbox. Such work will require the creation of a technical opening through the ferry’s deck, this is to facilitate the team to lift heavier items from the engine room and then be transported to the engineering workshop.

The team at the A&P yard at Hebburn, Tyne & Wear, is also carrying out CPP blade seal replacements on both sets of the vessel’s propellers. In addition to rudder-clearances, rudder beck flap renewals, the overhaul of flap-hinges, tail-shaft wear-downs and an overhaul of the steering gear.

Also A&P have been tasked in the removal of life-boats, life-rafts and the Marine Evacuation Systems that will all require servicing.

Published in Irish Ferries

The Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) Information

The creation of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) began in a very low key way in the autumn of 2002 with an exploratory meeting between Denis Kiely, Jim Donegan and Fintan Cairns in the Granville Hotel in Waterford, and the first conference was held in February 2003 in Kilkenny.

While numbers of cruiser-racers were large, their specific locations were widespread, but there was simply no denying the numerical strength and majority power of the Cork-Dublin axis. To get what was then a very novel concept up and running, this strength of numbers had to be acknowledged, and the first National Championship in 2003 reflected this, as it was staged in Howth.

ICRA was run by a dedicated group of volunteers each of whom brought their special talents to the organisation. Jim Donegan, the elder statesman, was so much more interested in the wellbeing of the new organisation than in personal advancement that he insisted on Fintan Cairns being the first Commodore, while the distinguished Cork sailor was more than content to be Vice Commodore.

ICRA National Championships

Initially, the highlight of the ICRA season was the National Championship, which is essentially self-limiting, as it is restricted to boats which have or would be eligible for an IRC Rating. Boats not actually rated but eligible were catered for by ICRA’s ace number-cruncher Denis Kiely, who took Ireland’s long-established native rating system ECHO to new heights, thereby providing for extra entries which brought fleet numbers at most annual national championships to comfortably above the hundred mark, particularly at the height of the boom years. 

ICRA Boat of the Year (Winners 2004-2019)