The Latest German Ferry Mystery Has Been Solved...

NoDutyCalls

SecretsAndAnchorTiesVille

The identification of the Canadian company apparently attempting to keep their duty-waived, German-built ferry a media black-cloaked & super-secret appears to have been made.

By the newly-minted dynamic maritime power duo of Chris from 'On The Waterfront' and Dave from 'The Galloping Beaver'.

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First, Christina types thusly:

A reader appears to have solved the ferry mystery that I have been poking at, with great frustration and clearly with way too few brains.

I’ll just post Dave’s comment up and let it go at that....

Then Dave comments:

I give you OCEANEX. ShipPax in Sweden (paid membership required for access) announced on their news-ticker on 14 Dec 11 that “OCEANEX ro-ro ordered at Flensburger”.

This is the second ship OCEANEX will have built in Germany. The Oceanex Avalon was built at J.J. Seitas in Hamburg. Then Hynes paid the 25% duty.

Problem now, of course, is that making a big splash about getting merchantmen built offshore while the Harper gesellschaft is making bold announcements about multi-billion dollar outlays to Canadian yards for government vessels is a little embarrassing… for the government. It will start to highlight the gross inadequacies of the Canadian shipbuilding industry and the fact that there will be at least a 10 year ramp up to modernize the yards and develop a qualified workforce.

I have no doubt that there was no Canadian yard with the design engineering capability to develop the type of ship needed for a high capacity short sea line through the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the east coast of NFLD. In short, there isn’t a Canadian yard yet capable of building a 210 meter anything, much less a versadeck ro-ro.

Flensburger otoh, has been building a batch of ro-ros (for the British navy’s strategic reserve no less) and has the design engineering capability to make the adaptations necessary. And then there’s the issue of cheap financing.

If you want and example of how poor Canadian ship design capability really is just watch the navy. The combat support ships (once cancelled) have been reborn. Only now they are looking at something like the German Berlin-class replenishment vessel. The goal is to get the German design altered to Canadian requirements and then have them sell the adapted design to a Canadian yard for building.

Pass the popcorn. This is going to be fun to watch....

So.

Here is what I would like Chris' and Dave's opinion on....

Has (or will) the lifting of the 'duty' on foreign built ships of which we speak help or hurt the Canadian shipbuilding industry (and/or the people who work in it)?

That latter question is put to them both because I suspect that that there may be a 'Hochsteining' of the industry going on here that will soon be followed by the Harpoons' faux resurrection, wherein the rising will essentially take the form of an anti-union ash-covered Phoenix Sun.

Or some such thing.

But, then again, maybe I'm just off my maritime-challenged rocker.

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And that, my friends is more maritime news and analysis than you will get in a month of Sunday's papers 'round here these days.

Which, of course brings us to the following on a lazy Saturday morning before the Christmas tree-trooping begins (Bigger E is home! Film at 11)...

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