Latest ferry from Polish shipyard arrives on the Clyde

Sister to the mv BUTE delivered last year, the latest new ferry built for Caledonian MacBrayne, the mv ARGYLE, arrived on a day soaked, not with April showers, but with April sunshine this morning, 29th April 2007.

Enthusiasts and Caledonian MacBrayne travellers alike have been awaiting the new ferry, but probably true to say that the former have anticipated her arrival long before your average Rothesay-goer has, with AIS screens being hungrily scanned as she left her builders in Gdansk until her arrival, ( via a short stop in Portland) on the Firth of Clyde's welcoming waters earlier on today.

She was launched last year on the 12th of September by the Remontowa shipyard in Gdansk,  Poland  and is the second of two virtually identical vessels to come from the yard for Caledonian MacBrayne.

She will run alongside her sister BUTE on the Wemyss Bay-Rothesay route. She can carry of up 60 cars and 450 passengers, and will sail at 14 knots. Although ARGYLE watchers reported she did well in excess of 15 knots as she stormed up the Irish Sea!

She is 72m long and 15.3m wide. She has been designed to be able to carry the new 60-seater coaches and 48 tonne artics to a maximum height of 5.1m, according to the Caledonian MacBrayne website.

Caledonian MacBrayne give an interesting bit of information on her name. According to their website the name was chosen, not simply due to the proximity of Argyll, but because of the (now) peculiar spelling. This fits the bill of having a name that is unique on the 30 minute crossing across the oft-times busy, and militarily, sensitive waters of the Firth of Clyde. However peculiar the spelling may or may not be, she is the seventh vessel on the Clyde to have borne this distinctive name.