New catamaran to be launched in February

A new catamaran, by the name of Maria Dolores, is expected to be delivered to Virtù Ferries in January with service scheduled to start the following month, the maritime company said.

The Maria Dolores is being built at the Austal shipyard in Fremantle and is presently afloat awaiting sea trials, set for the first week of November.

The Maria Dolores has been designed for the Malta-Sicily-Reggio Calabria route and will carry 600 passengers, 65 cars/campers and 10 trucks/TIR/coaches.

The vessel has a cruising speed of 36 knots. Crossings to Pozzallo will take one-and-a-half hours, three hours to Catania and four-and-a-half hours to Reggio Calabria. A year round scheduled service is being planned.

The company said it was in contact with major European touring clubs to attract the camper and car travellers. The Maria Dolores is registered under the Maltese Flag.

Virtù Ferries, a wholly Maltese owned company, operates the San Frangisk and San Pawl. The service connects the Italian ports of Venice, Rimini, Trieste and Ravenna with seven ports in Slovenia and Croatia carrying 85,000 passengers annually, or 40 per cent of the ferry passenger market in the region.