Wightlink's new catamarans arrive by ship
Wightlink Ferries' new high-speed catamarans, Wight Ryder I and Wight Ryder II, arrived in Portsmouth after a delivery voyage from FMBA's Cebu shipyard in the Philippines. The 40m vessels were transported to their new home as deck cargo on board the cargo vessel BBC Georgia on 12 July.

SeaFrance veteran for North Channel
In a surprise move, in July Stena Line purchased the 25-year-old car ferry SeaFrance Manet for deployment between Stranraer and Belfast from the coming autumn. Built by Chantiers Dubigeon at Nantes as Champs Elysees for SNCF services from Calais and Boulogne to Dover, the 1,650-passengers/280-car vessel was part owned by Stena in the mid-1990s as Stena Parisien running from Dieppe to Newhaven for Stena Sealink.

Cruise cancelled by virus
A 74-year old man died and 340 other passengers and 40 crewmembers were taken ill aboard Transocean Tours' Marco Polo (1965/22,080gt) in early July following an outbreak of the contagious norovirus bug. The Bahamian-registered ship had departed from Tilbury only two days earlier on a ten-night cruise around the British Isles with 769 passengers and 340 crew and was detained at Invergordon while local health officials carried out tests. The rest of the cruise was subsequently cancelled and those passengers well enough to travel were repatriated immediately.

Welcome splendid Splendida
MSC Cruises' new 137,936gt flagship MSC Splendida was christened in Barcelona by actress Sophia Loren on 12 July in a ceremony accompanied by a gala show under the ship's bows. The naming follows MSC Cruises' practice of christening its ships in different countries, a tradition that started with MSC Poesia in Dover in April 2008 and continues with MSC Magnifica in Hamburg next March.

No more 'footies' for SeaFrance
Once the lifeblood of cross-Channel ferry services, foot passengers have declined dramatically since the beginning of the car ferry era, and now SeaFrance has become the first Dover-Calais operator to withdraw the facility. No foot passengers will be carried from 1 October through the winter period and whether they will be reinstated next summer seems doubtful.

LD pull plug on Dieppe-Dover
A daily link with Dieppe, first started to help establish foothold in Dover for LD Lines, and covered from March by the LD Transmanche vessel Cote d'Albatre (2005/18,425gt), was withdrawn on 29 June. Cote d'Albatre continues to cover two daily Dover-Boulogne return crossings supporting the catamaran Norman Arrow, although these were suspended when the vessel returned to its original Dieppe-Newhaven route for seven days from 3 July.

Drop in Irish Ferries traffic
During the first 25 weeks of 2009, loadings on Irish Ferries services from Dublin to Holyhead, Rosslare-Pembroke and Rosslare to Roscoff and Cherbourg dipped 6.6 per cent to 145,500 cars and by 9.7 per cent to 571 ,000 passengers. The Irish Continental Group reported to shareholders before a June annual meeting that freight had taken an even bigger hit, dropping 23 per cent to 93,700 units compared to 2008.

Costa Europa to Thomson
Costa Europa (1986/53,872gt) has been bareboat chartered to Thomson Cruises for ten years from next April and, as Thomson Dream, will sail from Palma on weekly cruises in the Western Mediterranean. The UK operator has an option to purchase the ship, the largest it has ever operated, after five years. Costa Europa is the oldest unit in the ever-expanding Costa fleet, taking into account that the 1969-built Costa Marina (25,558gtgt) and Costa Allegra (28,430gt) were completely rebuilt as cruise ships from their original freighter roles in 1990 and 1992.

Maiden caller at Newport
Newport, Gwent, received its first ever cruise ship visit on 13 July when Holland America Line's Prinsendam (1986/37,845) made a ten-hour call with 800 mostly-American passengers and 425 crew members, en route from Waterford and later bound for Falmouth.

Equinox Godmother
Nina Barough, founder of the breast cancer awareness charity 'Walk the Walk', christened Celebrity Cruises' new Celebrity Equinox at Southampton on 29 July. The 2,850-passenger ship entered service two days later on an eight-night cruise to the Norwegian Fjords. Her official maiden voyage on 8 August was a ten-night sailing from the Hampshire port to Civitavecchia via various ports.

Gulf navies mean business
Gulf neighbours Oman and the United Arab Emirates have 'launched' the lead vessels of their latest newbuild warship projects one day apart at separate European shipyards. First to enter the water via ship-lift was the UAE's corvette Baynunah (P171) at Constructions Mécaniques de Normandie facility in Cherbourg on 25 June. At 72m the missile craft is the largest vessel ever built by the French shipyard.

A mixture of old and new
Work on the Pakistan Navy's newbuild project for four F22P (Type 053H3) frigates on order from China is progressing well. The first, PNS Zulfiqar, is on schedule for delivery in August followed by the second, PNS Shamsheer, before the end of the year.

Exercise Konkan
An Indian Navy Task Group, comprising the 6,700-tonne destroyer INS Delhi, the Project 16A frigates Beas and Brahmaputra, and the tanker INS Aditya, visited Portsmouth from 17 to 20 June during a two-month deployment. The port visit took place ahead of a six-day exercise in the south coast exercise areas and the south west approaches with the Royal Navy.

More slow boats to China
The French shipping giant CMA CGM has moved into the ranks of shipping lines with a fleet capacity of one million TEU following the addition of the 5,744TEU CMA CGM Vancouver (ex-Hanjin Vienna). The ship, chartered from Hanjin Shipping, is expected to join the new Columbus/TP-3/TP-9 pendulum service, launched jointly with Maersk Line, linking Japan, China, South East Asia and the US East Coast via Suez, SE Asia, China, Korea and the Pacific North West.

Evergreen to withdraw 31
Looking at what its chairman Chang Yung-fa describes as a 'gruesome' excess of vessel capacity in the container trades, Taiwan's Evergreen Line plans to withdraw 31 of its oldest ships from service and scrap many of them.

Queen Mary for sale
Queen Mary has been put up for sale - not the former liner in Long Beach, but her Clyde-built namesake in London. The turbine steamer was built at Dumbarton in 1933 as a Clyde excursion vessel, being renamed Queen Mary II in 1934 to free her name for the new Cunarder, and she remained in service on the Clyde until 1978.

Wincham scrapped
Breakers have demolished a vessel which was not only on the National Register of Historic Ships, but which also received a £47,500 Lottery grant just eight years ago. The Weaver packet MV Wincham, built by Yarwoods at Northwich in 1948 for ICI Liverpool, was scrapped on a slipway at Bromborough in April.

Shieldhall has surgery
Shieldhall is moving to a new home. The 1,792grt former sludge carrier, the largest working steamship of her type in Britain, is not leaving Southampton, however, but just moving to Berth 29. She was due to take up residence at her new berth, which has improved car parking, on 1 May.