Germany: HANSA’s “Ship of the Year” Award Goes to Flensburg’s Seatruck Progress

HANSA’s "Ship of the Year" Award Goes to Flensburg's Seatruck Progress

HANSA’s “Ship of the Year” title for the most innovative vessel built in Germany 2011 goes to ‘Seatruck Progress’.

Last year completions of ships delivered from German yards unfortunately decreased once again. Container ships, the lion’s share of newly built vessels of the decades before, ran out and probably the last two German-built came into service in 2011.

Special-purpose vessels like cruise ships, ferries, mega yachts, offshore or naval ships are the products of the future. This trend is also evident when looking at HANSA’s “Ship of the Year” award list, with no cargo ship having received this title since the year 2000.

In 2011, it is again a specialized vessel that wins the award: The RoRo freight ferry ‘Seatruck Progress’ is the latest delivery of Flensburger Schiffbau-Gesellschaft (FSG) and one of its most innovative in recent years. The ship was launched in August last year and delivered to the customer Seatruck Ferries in December. It is the first of a quartet of very compact and energy-efficient vessels ordered by the British ferry operator. The four ships are identically 142 m long, 25 m wide and can carry up to 155 trailers. Freight ferries are the exquisite speciality of FSG, and the yard is in the position to produce these vessels always more efficient, less fuel consuming and much more economic than comparable ships built by competing yards worldwide. According to FSG, “the fuel consumption of the four Seatruck ferries is up to 30 % lower than conventional designs“.

This is one of the reasons why HANSA decided to award the title “Ship of the Year 2011” to FSG. It is already the fourth award of this kind from HANSA magazine for the yard and the third for a FSG-made ferry since 2003. Nine years ago the price went to RoRo freight ferry ‘Tor Magnolia’, in 2006 ConRo ferry ‘Pauline’ was the winner. In connection with the launch of the third vessel in the series, ‘Seatruck Performance’, on 12 January 2012 in Flensburg, the award certificates were given to Peter Sierk, FSG’s Managing Director, as well as to Alistair Eagles, Managing Director, Irish Sea, at Seatruck Ferries. Almost 100 guests who had taken part in the naming and launching ceremony of ‘Seatruck Performance’ before attended the handover.

[mappress]

Shipbuilding Tribune Staff, February 15, 2012; Image: fsg-ship