Aida from a different angle

The autocarrier Aida has been a regular caller in Halifax for some time, but I got a slightly different angle on her today as she sailed. After her normal call at Autoport to unload cars, she moved over to pier 31 at noon time to unload a crawler crane, a truck crane and many components for them.
When she sailed at 1630 she was more broadside to Halifax than when she sails directly to sea from Autoport.

Built in 1991, the ship measures 52,288 gross tons and has a capacity of 6,118 cars. She also carries other RoRo cargo. Flying the Swedish flag, a member of the Wallenius Lines, she sails under the joint fleet of Wallenius Wilhelmsen.

Pioneers in auto transport, Wallenius Lines built bulk carriers that could double as car carriers, thus earning freight revenue on what would otherwise have been costly ballast voyages. However as auto transport became more global, with cars moving both ways across oceans, they converted the bulk carriers to pure car carriers by adding multi-storey hangars above the main deck and car decks in the holds. To provide visibility over the bow, the hangars were stepped back from the bow and the bridge deck was raised.

A previous Aida, originally built as a car carrying bulker in 1973, was converted in 1980 to a dedicated car carrier, but was finally scrapped in 1987 as more efficient pure car carriers came along. Unloading ramps on the ship's starboard side are not visible in this photo, but their frames project above the top of the deck hangars at two locations.

And yes the herring gull on the ice chunk in the lower photo is no doubt a distant ancestor of the one observing from pier 42 today. Both photos were taken from almost exactly the same place.