Atlantis heads for Elbe service
North German ferry and excursion specialist Cassen Eils is due to take its latest acquisition into service soon after local overhaul and maintenance work, reports Tom Todd.
The 26.6m long and 6.6m wide former Wikinger Princess, which draws 1.3m, was bought late last year by Cassen Eils from Reederei Müller in Kappeln as part of a fleet expansion move. The previous owners had operated the now 18 year old two deck excursion boat since 2008. It carries 200 passengers and has operated on the 20 mile long Schlei inlet between the town of Schleswig and the Baltic Sea in northern Germany.
It has already been revealed that Wikinger Princess will be renamed Atlantis before entering service with Cassen Eils and will be the third and smallest boat of that name to have served with the owner. It will operate as an excursion and charter boat on the Elbe Estuary between Cuxhaven and Brunsbüttel. Its two bigger predecessors served on the Heligoland ocean route, the second ship until as late as 2015.
As this issue of Maritime Journal went to press it was not known exactly when the the new fleet addition would begin its service.
Corina Habben, spokeswoman for Cassen Eils parent company AG Ems, told Maritime Journal mid March that the boat was still in winter quarters and that a timetable for operation was not yet available. A statement last year after acquisition said “from Easter”, but that seemed unlikely with the boat still under wraps and with what Habben described as routine shipyard work and maintenance still to be carried out as well as painting expected to include a new livery.
Habben said it was possible the work would be carried out at the Mützelfeldtwerft in Cuxhaven, where many Cassen Eils boats have been handled. Asked if any major engine or other technical changes were foreseen she also reported that the technical equipment on Atlantis was “completely OK” and would need no major attention for now.
Wikinger Princess was completed in 1999 for a Bremerhaven shipowner by the P.H. Tinnemans Shipyard in Maasbracht in the Netherlands. It cost €1.5 million when first built and was in service initially as Lale Andersen. What Cassen Eils paid for it was not reported.
It is driven by two MAN 190kW/268hp main engines developing 9 knots and an unidentified bow thruster, which Captain Ewald Bebber at Cassen Eils said had shown “particularly good manoeuvering qualities” during a demonstration on the Schlei inlet. He also said the new owners had been impressed by the boat’s “good technical characteristics”.
