Superfast Ferries

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Superfast XI bound to Ancona passing Kefalonia island
Superfast XI bound to Ancona passing Kefalonia island
Blue Star 1 in the Firth of Forth, en route from Rosyth to Zeebrugge.
Blue Star 1 in the Firth of Forth, en route from Rosyth to Zeebrugge.

Superfast Ferries is a Greece-based ferry company founded in 1993 by Pericles Panagopulos and Alexander Panagopulos. Together with Blue Star Ferries, it is a subsidiary company of Attica Group, which is listed on the Athens Stock Exchange.

[edit] Routes

As of 2007, Superfast Ferries operates lines in several parts of Europe, on the Adriatic Sea and the North Sea. These are:

[edit] Adriatic Sea

[edit] North Sea

The North Sea service is mainland Scotland's only direct, scheduled ferry service to and from Continental Europe, although ferries also operate from Shetland to Denmark, the Faroe Islands, Iceland and Norway via the Smyril Line. This service is now run in conjunction with Blue star ferries which Attica group own a majority share of. Blue Star 1 has replaced Superfast X on the route.

On the 29th of May, it was announced that Superfast Ferries would withdraw from the North Sea service, citing that the route was no longer commercially viable. The last sailing will be on the 13th of September, after which, Blue Star 1 will be reallocated to the Mediterranean services.

[edit] Vessel allocations

In Winter 2005, Superfast ferries removed one of the two ships operating the link between Zeebrugge and Rosyth, thus turning the daily link from Belgium to Scotland into one operated only every other day. Superfast IX joined the two ship operation between Hanko and Rostock to serve the growing demand in the Finland - Germany service. In April 2006, Superfast and Attica once more took the market by surprise by agreeing to sell the Superfast VII, Superfast VIII and Superfast IX ice-class ferries to Estonian operator Tallink for €310 million.

In August 2006 Attica enters into an agreement to sell to Veolia Transport its ice-class vessel Superfast X trading between Scotland and Belgium for € 112mln. The delivery of Superfast X took place in January 2007 and she has since been renamed Jean Nicoli.

In addition, Superfast introduced a new "roll-on roll-off" (RoRo) service between Uusikaupunki and Rostock in January of 2005. Attica has since moved one of the RO/RO ships RORO MARIN to there Adriatic Sea routes.

It is also hoped that in 2009, Superfast will be the preferred provider for a Roll-on Roll-of route between Great Yarmouth, United Kingdom and IJmuiden in Holland.

[edit] Fleet

[edit] Current fleet

Ship Built Entered service
for Superfast		 Traffic area Gross tonnage Notes
MS Superfast V 2001 2001 Adriatic Sea 32,728 GT
MS Superfast VI 2001 2001 Adriatic Sea 32,728 GT
MS Superfast XI 2002 2002 Adriatic Sea 30,902 GT
MS Superfast XII 2002 2002 Adriatic Sea 30,902 GT
MS Blue Star I 2000 2007 North Sea 29,415 GT Transferred from the fleet of sister company Blue Star Ferries.
MS Blue Horizon 1987 Unknown Unknown 27,320 GT Transferred from the fleet of sister company Blue Star Ferries.

[edit] Former ships

Ship Years in service Gross tonnage Status as of 2008
MS Superfast I 1995—2004 23,663 GT Since 2004 MS Eurostar Roma for Grimaldi Ferries
MS Superfast II 1995—2003 23,663 GT Since 2006 MS Mega Express Four for Corsica Ferries
MS Superfast III 1998—2002 29,067 GT Since 2002 MS Spirit of Tasmania II for TT-Line (Australia)
MS Superfast IV 1998—2002 29,067 GT Since 2002 MS Spirit of Tasmania I for TT-Line (Australia)
MS Superfast VII 2001—2006 30,285 GT Since 2006 sailing for Tallink
MS Superfast VIII 2001—2006 30,285 GT Since 2006 sailing for Tallink
MS Superfast IX 2002—2006 30,285 GT Since 2006 sailing for Tallink
MS Superfast X 2002—2007 29,800 GT Since 2008 MS SeaFrance Molière for SeaFrance

[edit] External links

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Current Ferry Operators of Scotland
See Also: Transport Scotland