Clear and not so clear

 The autocarrier Asian Captain arrived in Halifax yesterday, March 14, just over a month after its last call. It was here February 6 and since then has been to New York, Brunswick, Charleston, Bremerhaven, Zeebrugge and Southampton. This is the usual circuit for ships in the Wallenius Wilhelmsen Ocean transatlantic service, (It skipped Goteborg this time however.) Despite the EUKOR (Europe Korea) name, parent company Wilhelmsen also uses the Eukor ships to transport new European cars to North America. 

The Asian Captain stopped first at Autoport to discharge cars, then today, March 15, moved over to the Halifax side of the harbour to unload RoRo cargo at Pier 9C. That move necessitated passing through the Narrows to Bedford Basin, turning and coming back alongside, starboard side to the dock.

With assistance of the tugs Atlantic Oak and Atlantic Beaver the move was made quite neatly, and allowed a good view of both sides of the ship. Despite the hundreds of sections of gas pipe stacked on the pier there is still lots of room for the RoRo cargo such as agricultural, forestry and mining equipment.

Built in 1998  by Hyundai Ulsan the Asian Captain was originally a 55,729 gt, 21,466 dwt vessel, but in 2007 it was lengthened from 228.78m to 248m overall length, thus increasing its tonnages to 71,383 gt, 25,765 dwt. Its original capacity of 6,246 CEU  increased to 6,460 CEU.

The mid-day clear conditions did not last however as showers of rain combined with snow took over late in the afternoon, preventing clear views of the arriving NYK Remus on THE Alliance's AL5 service.

The ship is east bound from Pacific coast ports via Panama and Saint John, NB to Europe. One of several Constellation class ships the 55,534 gt, 65,981 dwt vessel was built in 2009 by Hyundai, Samho and has a capacity of 4922 TEU including 330 reefers. 

The NYK Remus has been here many times, both for the old G6 Alliance in the 20 teens and since 2021 for THE Alliance.  Not so the outbound ship MSC Sines R. on the CANEX 2 service from Montreal for its namesake port of Sines, Portugal.

 

It was built by Samsung Geoje in 2001 and measures 37,113 gt, 39,978 dwt with a capacity of 3430 TEU including 800 reefers.  It retains one 45 tonne SWL crane aft, but three more cranes once mounted forward have been removed - apparently since joiing MSC. 

The ship was launched as Santa Cristina, but was delivered as P + O Nedlloyd Bantam and carried that name until 2005 when it was renamed Santa Cristina. In 2010 it became Cristina Star and in 2020 MSC Sines R. 

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