Another Rhine ferry for Warnow River

The 34m long ferry, now the most modern vessel with Schütt’s Rostocker Personenschifffahrt, was built by small ship specialist Lux Werft on the Rhine, 500 km southwest of the Warnow. The yard’s Hilde Weckauff told MJ the vessel was sailed down the Rhine to the North Sea and through the Kiel Canal and the Baltic to Rostock,

In service with the so called Blaue Flotte, Hansestadt Rostock is 8.2m wide, draws 1.2m, displaces 150m3 and carries up to 250 passengers. It is driven by two Deutz BF 6M 1013 MC engines, each of 182 kW, over Schottel STP 320 propellers and is also equipped with a Schottel STT 010 bow thruster.

A 29.2m, 250 passenger ferry with the same name was delivered by Lux in 2008 with MAN/Schottel propulsion and has now been renamed Kasper Ohm. The 29.2m Mecklenburg was delivered in 2003 and in the same year Schütt acquired its fourth Lux ferry, the 32.2m Rostocker 7.

No price was given for the latest ferry, but Lux last year completed a similar ship costing SFr 2.4m for Swiss owner SGH. That ship, the 33.9m Seetal, was for 200 passengers and reports said more than SFr 6m would have to be paid now for a ship boasting its space.

Slimmer than its Warnow counterpart at 6.5m wide, Seetal displaces 110 tons. Local reports, no doubt with an eye to recent inland ferries of unusual design, described it as ‘a ship that looks like a ship’, an accolade that might also apply to Hansestadt Rostock.

Seetal is also propelled by a 182kW Deutz/Schottel engine plant, this one fitted with a particle filter. It also has a Schottel pump jet as an emergency auxiliary.

By Tom Todd