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2021 Newsletter week 26

Jul 01
2

Slow Restart of Passenger Ferry Travel to Norway

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It has now finally become easier to enter Norway. People who are fully vaccinated or who have had COVID-19 during the past six months are exempt from entry quarantine.

Currently, only a certificate (Norwegian, Danish, Swedish or EU digital COVID-19 certificate) with a QR code that can be verified by Norwegian authorities is considered to be a secure and verifiable way to document vaccination or having had COVID-19.

Color Line: a few weeks ago the service between Oslo and Kiel was resumed. The service between Sandefjord and Strömstad will restart with COLOR HYBRID on Monday July 5.

COLOR VIKING returns mid July.

DFDS: Oslo – Frederikshavn – Copenhagen route will resume sailings on 2 July for PEARL SEAWAYS and 3 July for CROWN SEAWAYS. Passenger capacity is reduced.

Fjord Line: both STAVANGERFJORD and BERGENSFJORD are in normal operation. The new FJORD FSTR makes one daily round trip between Kristiansand and Hirtshals. This becomes 2 return trips as from July 1.

The reintroduction of OSLOFJORD is imminent, after a test crossing between Norway and Sweden on June 30.

Norwegian Institute of Public Health
Jul 01
2

Interislander Signs Up for a New Era of Cook Strait Ferries

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KiwiRail and Korean shipyard Hyundai Mipo Dockyard (HMD) have now signed a binding contract for the delivery of two new, state-of-the-art, Cook Strait ferries.

The first will arrive in 2025 and the second in 2026.

The contract price for the two ferries is USD$369 million (NZ$551m).

The two, rail-enabled ferries, when running at full operating capacity, will be able to carry nearly double the number of passengers, and commercial and passenger vehicles when compared with the current fleet.

The rail freight capacity will triple. The only currently rail-enabled ferry ARATERE can carry a maximum of 27, sixty-foot equivalent wagons per sailing. The two new rail-enabled ships will be able to carry 40, sixty-foot equivalent wagons per vessel on up to three return sailings each per day. That is a 300 per cent increase in capacity at peak.

Design: OSK Shiptech.

Contract signing: Stephen O’Keefe, iReX Programme Director; Paul Harper, Chairman of Project Governance Board; iReX, Greg Miller, KiwiRail Group Chief Executive;  KiwiRail Chief Operating Officer, David Gordon, Capital Projects and Asset Development; Walter Rushbrook, Executive General Manager, Interislander;  Massimo Soprano, iReX Ships Programme Manager. On Screen: Mr. Sam Ka, President & CEO of Korea Shipbuilding & Offshore Engineering (KSOE) and members of the Hyundai Mipo Dockyard team.