Neil Doorley outlines the changes DFDS Seaways made to Malo Seaways before her launch
By
Rebecca Gibson |
This article was first published in the Spring/Summer 2015 issue of Cruise & Ferry Interiors.
This April, UK ferry operator DFDS Seaways welcomed the return of a fifth ferry to its Dover-France fleet. Named after French coastal city Malo Les Bains, the 170m Malo Seaways transports 400 passengers and 375 cars on the 90-minute Dover-Calais route alongside Calais Seaways 20 times per day.
Originally, the ferry was built as European Ambassador for P&O Irish Sea in 2000 and sailed as Stena Line’s Stena Nordica from 2004 before she was leased to DFDS Seaways on a short-term charter this spring. Prior to joining DFDS Seaways, she underwent a three-week refit and rebrand in drydock at Damen’s Dunkerque shipyard.
During the drydock, Damen’s engineers made significant bow and stern modifications to enable the vessel to berth using linkspans in Dover and Calais, rather than using her existing onboard ramps.
“This conversion was challenging because the berths in both ports are designed to accommodate vessels with a beam of 28m, but Malo Seaways is only 25m wide,” explains Doorley. “It took us three months of research to design the new bow and stern tables to ensure the ferry would securely fit in the berths and provide a correctly positioned platform to the shore. Damen also converted the vessel’s engines to run on marine gas oil to enable her to sail in the sulphur emission control area between England and France.”
Thankfully, notes Doorley, Stena Nordica’s interior only needed minimal updates as it already offered a ‘Road Kings’ area for commercial drivers and a full-service restaurant, café bar, shop, children’s area and a seating area for passengers.
“The ferry’s original layout suited our needs, the passenger and onboard services areas were in good condition and we only have her on a short-term charter, so we didn’t need to make extensive changes,” comments Doorley. “However, marine flooring company Durastic relayed the galley deck, while turnkey contractor Trimline manufactured and fitted new equipment in the area to ensure it met our operational standards. Trimline also replaced the flooring in the ship’s toilets, while we installed our own catering, service, IT and ePOS equipment.”
DFDS Seaways also worked with Air Creative Marketing and RK Graphics to update the ferry’s interior and exterior safety, directional, and commercial signage with its standard logo, brand messaging, fonts and colours. “We carried out a full audit of the existing signage and regularly visited RK Graphics during the production phase to ensure that the new signage was catalogued in the most efficient way to simplify the installation process,” says Doorley.
Despite the technical alterations and new equipment, Doorley argues that another element played a key role in transforming Stena Nordica into Malo Seaways. “Our dedicated onboard crew played a pivotal role in rebranding the ferry,” he says. “Michel Auclair, commercial head onboard Malo Seaways, and his team quickly familiarised themselves with the vessel and implemented DFDS Seaways’ standard practices to ensure that they could offer the same high level of customer service provided on all our ships.”