Irish Sea Route Changes
It has today been announced that DFDS has sold two routes on the Irish Sea to Stena Line. The sale covers the routes Birkenhead – Belfast and Heysham – Belfast, plus the four vessels, two of which are chartered, currently operating on these routes. Stena Line will also take over port operations in Birkenhead, Belfast and Heysham. This means that for the remaining two DFDS routes Birkenhead – Dublin and Heysham – Dublin they will effectively become a customer of Stena Line’s terminal services.
Although the transaction has been concluded with immediate effect and there are no conditions attached to the sale, it is still subject to regulatory clearance, and a transitional period has been put in place.
DFDS CEO Niels Smedegaard has stated, “The Irish routes we took over at the purchase of Norfolkline have, in the last two years, lost around a quarter of a billion Danish kroner (approx £28million). The prospect of continuing very difficult market conditions and overcapacity on the Irish Sea means it could be a long time before earnings improve significantly”.
DFDS operations between Dublin and the UK will continue as normal, with two ships on the Birkenhead route and one on the Heysham route.
Further to their purchase of the two Northern Irish routes from DFDS, Stena Line have also announced they will be closing their route from Fleetwood – Larne at the end of 2010. They have stated that in spite of their best endeavours the route has continued to trade with serious losses, and despite investigations of alternative strategies for the route it became apparent there was no option other than closure.
A press release from Stena Line states that “The opportunity to acquire the two routes operating to Northern Ireland from Birkenhead and Heysham became available subsequent to the decision to close Fleetwood – Larne and provides us with the means to continue to offer ‘diagonal’ services with a long term strategic outlook and scope for development, together with the creation of a major hub operation in Belfast in conjunction with our existing Stranraer – Belfast route”.
Freightlink would like to take this opportunity to thank existing customers for their support on the Fleetwood – Larne route, whilst reassuring new and existing customers that we will continue to be able to offer a full range of routes to and from Northern Ireland.
For further information on this please contact our Customer Service team on +44(0)844 847 9000.