TOWLINES

Following the delivery of more new vessels and the redeployment of others, the South Wales tugs Shireen S and Sea Endeavour have been sold to Saga Shipping & Trading of Oslo.

Shireen S , a2,640bhp single screw tug with a 35 ton bollard pull, was originally purpose built as the Kelty fortanker handling at Hound Point in 1976.

Sea Endeavour was the last tug built for the now defunct Bristol tug fleet of C J King in1980. The latter is also a single screw vessel of 3,150bhp and 46.5 tons bollard pull.

Abeille Liberte , the second of two new ETVs to be built and contracted to protect the French Atlantic seaboard will take up station at Cherbourg at the end of this month, replacing the Abeille Languedoc . The Abeille Liberte is the sister ship of the Abeille Bourbon (see Maritime Journal , May 2005), based in Brest since April 2005. Both 209 ton bollard pull and 20 knot vessels were built in Norway to a Rolls-Royce design for Les Abeilles International , and operate under contract to the Maritime Prefecture of the Channel and the North Sea area.

Hamburg based Harms Bergung Transport and Heavy Lift has ordered two more tugs from the Mutzelfeldtwerft Shipyard atCuxhaven. Already allocated the names Ursus and Janus , both will be similar to the Primus , delivered by the same yard early this year (see Maritime Journal , February 2005) but slightly larger and have a greater bollard pull of 220 tons. The tugs are scheduled for delivery in March and June of 2007. Mutzelfeldtwerft will also deliver the new tugs Magnus and Taurus , currently under construction for Harms , in July and October next year.