NEW: The Steam Packet’s Ro-Pax vessel Ben-my-Chree will operate all Heysham sailings until the end of September 2026, following the withdrawal from service of the company’s flagship Manxman due to mechanical faults. The Steam Packet says the Manxman’s propulsion shaft bearings were removed during an inspection and found to have sustained wear.
In a statement, the company confirmed specialist repairs are underway, but given the complexity of the repairs and challenges with sourcing components, the vessel is not expected to return to service for two months.
Manxman, which has a capacity for around 1,000 passengers and 240-300 vehicles depending on the mix of cars and commercial vehicles, was built by the Hyundai Mipo Dockyard, Ulsan, South Korea, and entered service between Douglas and Heysham on 17 August 2023. By comparison, the Ben-my-Chree carries just 500 passengers and around 200 cars, significantly fewer than Manxman.
The ‘Ben’, ordered in 1997 by the Steam Packet’s then owners Sea Containers, was designed specifically for the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company and its Douglas-Heysham service. It cost around £24 million and was built by Van der Giessen de Noord of the Netherlands. Ben-my-Chree entered service on Tynwald Day, 5 July 1998.
The Steam Packet plans to introduce another new vessel by 2030 with an estimated budget of £120 million to replace its 850-seat fast craft, Manannan. The project is currently in the planning and design phase. The new vessel will not be a direct replacement for the Manannan. It will likely be slower, but is intended to be able to operate year-round, unlike the summer-only catamaran.
With this in mind, it might be interesting to wind the clock back to 1997, before the arrival of the ‘Ben’, and an interview with former SPCo. managing director, Hamish Ross. In the interview with Manx Radio’s John Moss, Mr Ross discusses the design and construction of the new ferry, one which would go on to serve the Island for three decades.
Mr Ross joined the Steam Packet in 1994 and was appointed managing director in 1996, when the Packet was taken over by Sea Containers. He held that role until his retirement in 2007, after which he served on the Steam Packet Company’s supervisory board. He died in 2019 at the age of 75.
JOHN MOSS
As we've heard, the Steam Packet is to order a new vessel to be on the Manx run. Heysham to Douglas. It's a wee bit longer than the KING ORRY or will be. It's a bit broader in the beam as well. It's being built at the Rotterdam yard of Van der Giessen. I've been talking to the Packet’s managing director, Hamish Ross, who was showing off drawings of the £24 million-worth vessel. Got the drawing in front of me, but of course it's not much use to you, dear listener. So I asked Mr. Ross to actually tell us if he could give us a comparison of what the ship would be like.
HAMISH ROSS
She's quite similar to two of the new Irish Ferries’ ships, but to give you some feel for this, she's around 11m longer than THE KING ORRY. She, like THE KING ORRY, will be fully stabilised. She'll have two bow thrusts. She'll be twin screw, twin rudder. So she'll be highly manoeuvrable, very well capable of operating in both Heysham and Douglas harbours.
JOHN MOSS
She'll need to be manoeuvrable because this is quite a confined harbour in Douglas. Um, and obviously we do get adverse conditions quite often.
HAMISH ROSS
Oh, yes. But this ship would be very powerful, very manoeuvrable, and hopefully as successful as the KING ORRY in terms of her ability to manoeuvre within the harbours.
JOHN MOSS
The last ship we had built for Irish Sea conditions in 1976, the LADY OF MANN, was built at the Ailsa shipyard. You're going to the continent, to Rotterdam. Why?
HAMISH ROSS
Well, we looked around the world at yards around the world, including Britain. But we've come down and placed the order with Van der Giessen, a very fine Dutch yard, who build the ships just near Rotterdam. And I think we'll get a very high-quality ship from there. And they have a fine reputation in shipbuilding. We hopefully will have the ship next summer. So the timescale is fairly tight, but we're confident we'll meet it.
JOHN MOSS
That is very quick. Normally you're used to taking at least two years for a ship to appear, but it's been done in only a year.
JOHN MOSS
Well, I think the yard, first of all, was very modern. It's undercover, so work can progress no matter what the weather is like. You must have quality. We'll get that from Van der Giessen. And we were looking for price as well. And we're happy with the price we're paying.
JOHN MOSS
What about the speed? 19 knots. Slightly slower, I think, than the passenger ships. Um, faster perhaps than the PEVERIL?
HAMISH ROSS
No, she’s actually slightly faster than the KING ORRY, just slightly faster. And she has a bit up her sleeve at that. She'll be doing 19 knots at around 90% mean continuous rating of the engine. So we have a little bit of a wellie up our sleeve if you like.
JOHN MOSS
So she can go back and forth in a day, twice, two round trips…
HAMISH ROSS
She is then capable of doing two round trips a day to Heysham. And that's obviously been part of her specification.
JOHN MOSS
What about the name? Obviously important to an island that we retain some sort of Manx name. Will we get it?
HAMISH ROSS
Yes, I'm sure we will. I think the board certainly are very keen on a traditional name. I certainly like them as well. I think what we'll probably try to do is have a competition among local schools to come up with one of the most popular traditional names, but perhaps with a space for something new as well, if they feel like that. But I suspect we will go for a very traditional name.
JOHN MOSS
Overall, obviously, Sea Containers are looking to build these various routes around the Irish Sea. Will this particular ship be associated with the Isle of Man for the foreseeable future?
HAMISH ROSS
I think she's built more or less custom-built for this route. I mean, I didn't mention the lane metreage earlier on; she is a lane metreage. In other words, her capacity for carrying wheeled traffic is almost twice as much as two and a half times that of the PEVERIL, and is more than the sum of the PEVERIL and THE KING ORRY put together. So she has a fine freight capacity. And she has also this good passenger capacity, which we can use for backup, and also for normal passenger carrying in the summertime.
JOHN MOSS
What will happen to THE ORRY when she appears?
HAMISH ROSS
Well, the ORRY we will be looking to sell, but not immediately after she arrives here. Obviously, we'll get the ship in, we'll prove her, we'll do her trials, etc., and when she enters service, hopefully, she should be very reliable. We’ll then look to the market and maybe some way of getting rid of the KING ORRY.
JOHN MOSS
And the PEVERIL?
HAMISH ROSS
The PEVERIL I think will keep as a standby vessel. I think, uh, the freight market is very important to us, as is the passenger market, of course, but I think we'll keep the PEVERIL as a standby vessel.
JOHN MOSS
The PEVERIL, obviously, is quite a veteran lady. Um, she's still up to being plowing back and forth.
HAMISH ROSS
Oh, yes, she's very much up to it. In fact, she's just finished her, uh, biannual overhaul recently, and she's in good shape, and she's a fine carrier. She's always a bit too small for us at the moment. And that's why we've gone for this replacement. But she can still do a good job.
JOHN MOSS
Hamish Ross. One of the people present at the press conference was Terry. I think we'll probably hear reference to this in the Cringle file tomorrow. One or two names were bandied about for the new vessel, and I can assure you it's not going to be named after any of the Spice Girls.
