Silja announces action plan for October

FINNJET-traffic in 2005 and future
Answers from Silja Germany's new Chief Executive Officer

The year 2004 showed Silja Line that a new route is hardly established in a few months. Passenger numbers were not really good and the planned year-round traffic ended up as a seasonal route. Hans Jürgen Rohrbach, ex. project leader Finnjet and CEO of Silja Line GmbH in Lübeck was replaced by Matti Orama (60) in the end of may, who is already ?Vice President International Sales and Marketing" at Silja Line Finland. The Finn has already been active in ferry business since 1974 and was already entrusted with FINNJET to Finnlines-times as marketing manager. From 1987 on, he directed the marketing division of Silja being responsible for marketing and sales of Silja Symphony and Silja Serenade.

Towards the German newspaper "Norddeutschlands Neusten Nachrichten" Orama said that 85.000 passengers are expected this year in the Finnjet-traffic, of which two thirds would be transported between Tallinn and Rostock. About 10.000 passengers will use Finnjet this year to get from Finland to Germany and back via Tallinn. Between Tallinn and St.Petersburg Silja expects 15.000 passengers this year..

About the future of Finnjets route Orama emphasized that Silja will keep Finnjet's schedule also in 2006. For the following years starting 2007 Silja would be even considering to extend the season from April to December. Furthermore Orama told that the ship would be chartered out this winter. (we reported? see below!). With improved marketing strategies Orama wants to hit the 100.000-passengers-per-year-line again, fort his purpose another new employee started her work at Silja Germany, it is Erja Koivula from Finland. Within the last 6 years Koivula was leading the group- and conference division at Silja Finland. She will now start directing the marketing and sales operations of Silja Germany. Koivula started her career at Silja Line in 1988.

Possible project for the offseason: FINNJET as EUROPE STAR
When a Baltic Sea ferry goes on Europe-Tour

As we all know, FINNJET seems to be currently "unemployed" in winters, but exactly this could change fore some months next year. The "Projektgemeinschaft für interkulturelle Kommunikation" is planning to charter Finnjet for 6 weeks in spring 2006 to make a floating fair called "Europe Star" out of her and go on Europe Tour as "Europe Star Line". But what is this all about? It is about a "Forum for People, Markets and Media in the EU". The target is a mobile fair and exhibition for exhibitors from all Europe:

"A centuries-old tradition is being revived: the fostering of connections across the seas. The Europe Star hails the return of this fascination with international relations ? in a new dimension and with a new role." As one of the executive officers of the project community explained to me today, there is no charter contract with Silja yet and this contract will only be signed if there are enough interested exhibitors. The plannings for this project were started already 2 years ago. Soon it became clear that a ship as location was the best choice and since the community also counts on a famous ship with "Aha-Experience", the FINNJET soon appeared as a very good chance. Besides Silja, lots of other shipping companies and ship brokers have been contacted, but Silja Line probably showed the best cooperation, since the ship would be otherwise anyway only laid up in Rostock. The organisation and arrangements were made in strong cooperation with Hans-Jürgen Rohrbach and Silja Germany, besides local meetings on board there have been also negotiations and intensive talks with Silja Finland, who also provided route plans and information. Besides representatives of economy also lots of european institutions are involved in this project. That makes it even less possible for Jürgen Hagenkötter to understand the comment of Tuomas Nylund of Silja Finland, that Silja will not charter out Finnjet for this purpose. But also in an email of Hans-Jürgen Rohrbach that was published in the german "Forum-Schiff" it is said, that this project is only an option for Silja and nothing is clear yet. Different perspectives on sides of Europe Star Line: Even if there is no contract yet, the "deal" is actually sure. Furthermore there would be already contracts with a company called Leitner, providing the project with exhibition cabins and equipment. The cardeck of the ferry shall be used as huge exhibition deck during the Europe-tour:

The planned Euro-Tour starts in Gdansk in Poland and ends after 6 weeks in Limassol on Cyprus. Possible dates were noted in a table on the left. Hagenkötter furthermore explained, that it is planned to arrive in the ports in the mornings at 10 AM, so that this event can be also noticed by media and people. Then there will be 2 days harbourtime, in which interested people may visit the ship's fair. If these adventurous plans can really come true remains to be seen. >> www.europe-star-line.com

FINNJET - Season's start 2005

WEBCAM IO Warnemünde, 28.04.2005, 18:04

The season started again on 26th April for FINNJET, the departure in Tallinn was just as scheduled at 18:00. Since this departure was added so shortly to the timetable, the ship was almost empty during the trip with only 63 passengers on board. Among these 63 Passengers were furthermore 35 people of an advertising film- or TV-Team, who are still on board right now. The long crossing lasted more than 36 hours and so Finnjet arrived in Rostock today morning in control of captain Magnus Slotte shortly after 9 AM - just as scheduled. The emptyness on board was then about to change as soon as the first regular trip started from Rostock; so about 550 passengers stepped on board today in Rostock, which is definately not bad for the time of the year according to Silja-CEO Rohrbach. Also generally the booking situation this year is much better than last year.

The crew on board is in the Passenger department about 80% of last year's crew while about 20% are new on board. Among them is also the new Cruise Manager Alexander Thurein. Tomorrow evening Finnjet will arrive in Tallinn and continue and finish her roundtrip until 2nd May. Thereafter the destination will be directly Riga, for the visit of US president Bush.

GTS FINNJET chartered by US-President Bush
Too low hotel accomodation capacities at state visit in Riga, 1,3 Million Euro

There are always things happening that nobody expects. As I heard today afternoon and as already discussed in "Forum Schiff" and my own Forum, FINNJET was shortly chartered in the time of 4th - 8th May! In this time will be no regular ferry services, I've got no idea what's going to happen with booked passengers! Because of too low hotel accomodation capacities in Riga, Silja Line offered FINNJET as hotelship. We are talking about payments of about 1,3 Million Euros here, as the latvian internetsite "Conference.LT" reports! Within this time FINNJET shall be used as accomodation of president Bush and his delegation of 700 people! For FINNJET-Passengers this means a period without Finnjet service from May 2nd until May 8th!! This means that in total 2 departures from Rostock were cancelled, the last arrival there will be on 2nd May. On 9th May the regular traffic then starts again from Tallinn to Rostock. To make this a bit more simple I've put up a schedule on the right. I RECOMMEND ALL BOOKED FINNJET PASSENGERS BETWEEN 02.05. AND 08.05.2005 TO CONTACT SILJA LINE IF THEY HAVE NOT CONTACTED YOU YET!! Even if it looks like that, I'm NOT KIDDING!! To Silja Line's information policy I won't say a word now.....!!!

02.05.2005: regular FINNJET arrival in Rostock. DEPARTURE CANCELLED !!!

04.05.2005 -08.05.2005: GTS FINNJET IS IN RIGA AS HOTEL SHIP FOR US-PRESIDENT BUSH

09.05.2005: GTS FINNJET Starts regular traffic again with departure from Tallinn to Rostock.

Transfer voyage to Tallinn

Photo: GTS FINNJET departs Rauma, 18.04.2005, Rauma Stevedoring OY Webcam

Yesterday evening the time had come, the drydock was flooded again and after about one week at Finnyards Finnjet left the place again, where about one year ago investments of 15 Million Euros were done in renovating the ship. Exactly at 21:15 local time the ferry started her way with the help of tugs to the capital of Estonia, Tallinn, where she arrived already today in the early evening at 18:28 local time. As usual, I can offer a Webcam-movie again, thanks to Rauma Stevedoring OY for their Webcam in the port area :) HERE is the Download-Link (WMV, 0,56 MB). This means that the transfer voyage lasted only 21 hours, which can be called "fast" according to the fact that the traffic will first start on 26th April. Along the works done in the shipyard are not only cleaning the underwater part from all kinds of sediments after the long trafficless time in Rostock but also simple guarantee checks, which were needed due to several regualtions. Originally the docking time was planned to be longer, but parts of the works that do not really need a drydock had to be moved because of the keel laying of a new Tallink-ferry on 21st April in the same drydock. Right now Finnjet is parking at the new cruise quay 25 in Tallinn, where mostly preparations for the seasonstart on 26th april are being made, before the ship can leave Tallinn with passengers on that day at 18:00 from quay 5 to Rostock. The whole Crew has been on board for some days now already and consists in huge parts of the same personnel that has already been there last year. I got to know via Ilja Berunenko that there are again short-time working contracts on board in the passengerdepartments. For example there is a 40 day Rhythm, i.e. after 40 working days they get holidays and thereafter again 40 days of work on board. The permanent bridge and engine crew has a regular 16 day rhythm - 16 days work, 16 days holiday.

Back home!

Photo: GTS FINNJET in Rauma, 11.04.2005, Rauma Stevedoring OY Webcam

The Finns got her back - at least for 1,5 weeks. Yesterday morning Finnjet arrived in Aker Finnyards' drydock in Rauma after a 2-day-trip from Rostock. Different than last year, the ship was directly taken to the drydock, where it docked at 08:35 AM local time. While my current information is that Finnjet remains docked until 23.04., Rauma's ship-information system shows departure on 18.04.2005 at 12:00. (http://www.rauma.fi/pds/pds.dll/pds?0?1?10.) I hope to clarify the exact date as soon as possible. Just as last year, I will now present you a small Webcam-movie (07:00-08:00AM), displaying Finnjet's arrival. Due to the rainy weather I'm afraid it is not possible to see very much in the film. Anyway many thanks to Rauma Stevedoring OY for their Webcam in port :) HERE is the Link to the film. (WMV, 1,49 MB)

TO ALL FINNJET-CREW-MEMBERS AND FINNYARDS WORKERS: IF YOU'VE GOT A DIGICAM WITH YOU, why not make some photos of the place with Finnjet in the dock and send them over to me. :) Me and my visitors would be very thankful!

A Lady wakes up from winter sleep

The times of silence on board of Finnjet are now finally over. More than six months of hibernation require hard resuscitation actions :-) For this reason Finnjet was transferred to Rostock's harbour bay B to quay 31 on 2nd April, where she could be loaded better (carramp)

and where it was also possible to place some small cranes and lifting platforms for paintjobs and other small works against corrosion. The photos were taken by our Rostocker "local reporter" Helge Kleinschmidt, who was as usual on site to tell us what was new on 5th April - thank you! :-) He told us: "The bow port is open and via the ex. Easy Line ramp it is possible to enter the ship's cardeck. Two men armed with paint buckets and brushes move along the ship with lifting platforms and do several paintjobs. According to the car that parked there, even the 2 experts from Finland have arrived." Quay 31 is incidently a very historic quay, since exactly 45 years ago, in April 1960 the unloading of the MS "Schwerin" started the era of Rostocks Seaport. Helge: "And if someone had asked me 20 years ago, if I can imagine that Finnjet will ever park on this position, then I would have driven and delivered him at the loony bin personally." Afore Finnjet laid half a year in harbour bay A at quay 51.

Today, on 9th April the ship left the hanse city on the way to a place, where she was already one year ago: at Finnyards in Rauma. The arrival is expected for the day after tomorrow, 11.4. Possibly the ETA will be soon published on the homepage of Rauma's harbour: http://www.rauma.fi/pds/pds.dll/pds?0?1?10. Furthermore I want to remind you of the Webcam of Rauma Port, which already gave us some nice pictures last year.

The relatively long docking time of 12 days leaves room for speculations, that more than only a "guarantee check", as ex. Silja Germany CEO Rohrbach formulated, is standing on the to-do-list. Possibly we will see new modifications to the steering equipment, which caused several problems already last year.

Another interesting detail is the recent timetable amendment. Accordingly the passenger services will not start on 28th April in Rostock, but already on 26th April in Tallinn. So, Silja does not only save an empty baltic sea crossing but hopefully also a chaos like last year on the inaugural trip of the new route, since the first crossing from Tallinn to Rostock will take whole 38 hours! In Rostock itself will be then again 8 hours remaining until the regular services start.

Furthermore one short notice on my own account, within the last weeks and months I was fully blocked by school, renovation works and other hobbies , which caused an unability to keep the website updated...I count on your understanding. :-)

About 3 months before start

Almost half a year has passed since the last passengers were on board Finnjet. After the sudden winter break which started on 17th September last year we can now see light again at the end of the tunnel. On 28th April ferry services to St. Petersburg start again and already now the booking numbers exceed last year's booking numbers at this time of the year clearly. More than 47.000 Passengers have booked their Finnjet-trip so far for this year. This is unfortunately not valid for may, in this month Silja sees only a low demand. For this reason Silja offers a 20% discount for all cruise and ferry prices for trips between 28.4 and 30.5.05. The "May Special" makes it possible to cruise to St. Petersburg from Rostock including a full-day-excursion of choice for only 230€ per person in the cheapest case!! More information can be found on the Homepage of Silja Line Germany. >> www.siljaline.de Also all loyal Club Silja customers can be happy: They get a 20% discount on all Finnjet-tariffs if the trip is booked before 30.04.2005.

However, before Finnjet will transport any passengers, the ship will have another drydock visit at Finnyards in Rauma in april, which will be some kind of "guarantee check" one year after the conversion in the same shipyard. Furthermore FINNJET is supposed to get again modifications to the rudders according to the FCBS Forums.

Meanwhile it will be time to say "Good Bye!" to Silja Germany's CEO Rohrbach in March. He retires after more than 8 years at the top of Silja Germany. The commited Silja Boss leaves without any successor. This could mean the end of Silja Germany, apparently the whole traffic will be managed from Finland from the end of March on.

More decided seems the fact, that Silja will service the Germany-Russia route also in the future only seasonally. According to Silja Estonia it is not sure yet what will happen with Finnjet after the end of this year's season on 26th September. Therefore there are rumors that Silja plans to use Finnjet between Helsinki and Tallinn again, which would anyway require re-registering the ship and switching the crew.

FINNJET-traffic only until 23.09.2005

Silja Line Finland has once more declared FINNJET's route a summer route. First it was said that the final departure from Tallinn to Rostock will be on 29th september, however the newest german timetable brouchure is only valid until 23rd september 2005. It is not known yet what will happen after that date. It is anyway probable that Silja lays up FINNJET in Rostock again.

Compared to the former years the brouchure is pretty small and does not include the cruise prices. Furthermore interesting is the fact, that FINNJET got now an own brouchure while the other Silja Line-traffics are stated in another brouchure. The design appears to be similar to the design of the former year, however including new interior and exterior photos of the ship. Here are some example pages (click to resize )

As special feature I made an exclusive price comparison table 2004/2005. As reported earlier you can save a lot of money compared to 2004. But not always! Due to the fact that the return-trip-discount is no longer available in high-season, it happens in some cases that you even have to pay a lot more than still this year. The comparison table tells you in what cases this is.

SHOW (PDF, 160kb)
No responsibility for errors. Bookings and reservations can only be made at Silja Line or at your travel agent.

FINNJET-Prices 2005

Even if it was expectable: Next year will be a cheap FINNJET-travel year! Especially the passengers on the Tallinn - St. Petersburg leg may get quite happy! They will save almost in any cabin category about 50% compared to the prices of this year! Silja Line had to go this drastic step to be able to compete with Tallink on this route. The last season has furthermore shown, that the passenger and cargo load between Tallinn and St. Petersburg was still unacceptably low this year, which surely is mainly due to the prices.

Also the Rostock-St.Petersburg and Rostock-Tallinn prices are falling. Often this means -20% compared to 2004! This is especially notable with the Seaside and partly also Commodore cabins. The car transportation will be also about 20% cheaper than still this year. Last but not least it has to be mentioned that the "Medium Season" will not exist in 2005: In that time of the year passengers pay the Off-Season tariffs, which is also like a discount.

I refer to a timetable and prices preview of Mare-Baltikum-Reisen, so it is not an official information of Silja Line, that is why I will not go into details yet. As soon as Silja Line publishes their timetable/prices brouchure 2005, I will publish a price comparison table 2004/2005 here. :) Check Out FINNJETweb in some days again!

The early end
Yesterday the active service for 2004 ended

As reported earlier, Silja Line has stopped all FINNJET-Services within the period of 17.09.2004-28.04.2005. So, the last scheduled sailing ended yesterday in Rostock. At about 11:27 local time the breakwaters were passed and at 11:55 the ship was docked in the port of Rostock.

"Office decision "

In an interview with the german newspaper "Norddeutschlands Neueste Nachrichten" (NNN) Hans-Jürgen Rohrbach, Silja Germany's CEO, called the decision made to abort the Finnjet traffic until April an "office decision". The booking numbers for this autumn, especially for november, were really bad, while there has been a strong demand for ice cruises in February. This is why Rohrbach tried to convince the Finns to restart the route already in February, which was of no sucess however. So, Finnjet will be laid up in Rostock for more than 7 months now and 20.000 bookings have to be cancelled.

900 Passengers in average

In total Finnjet carried 35.000-40.000 passengers this summer (different sources show different numbers). This means an average passengerload of ca. 900 passengers per crossing and an average utilization of 53% - for the first year very much acceptable for Silja Line. According to an estonian newspaper, next november some crossings had only 100 booked passengers - far off any profitability. Hence, instead of making big losses next winter, Silja decided to invest 5 Million EUR in marketing the route and ship, so that the traffic will be of more sucess next year especially in the low season. For most of the crew the working contracts remain active; after a looong vacation they return to the ship in April.

All cabin windows on Starboard covered

As I heard from Helge Kleinschmidt, the ship is still lying on it's normal parking position. The front part of the ship with the cabins is now completely dark, in addition, all cabin windows on the starboard side are covered with curtains. The Silja seal is still lighted, also the Restaurants were still alight yesterday evening. Possibly the Finnjet-crew had a last party as end of their short time they have worked together. At last in the next days "Jetti" will then commence her first wintersleep in 27 years of active service.

GTS FINNJET to be left unused in Rostock for winter

Germany-Russia route closed for Winter !!!
After first indirect information one week ago now clearity

The problems have been fixed - first call in St. Petersburg

Photo: GTS FINNJET in St. Petersburg; T/S Maxim Gorki Webcam, Phoenix Seereisen

After about 2,5 round trips we are able to say that the difficulties and misfortunes on the new route and the ship have been solved. The first call in St. Petersburg on 23. June was trouble-free accordingly. As .rUFO reported, the happening was celebrated by St. Petersburg's government by the decision to heap up about 350 ha land at the west coast of the Vassili island. On this new area a new and bigger "Sea-Station" will be constructed, which will also offer improved capabilities for cruise ships of up to 300m length. As the internet newspaper "fontanka.ru" reported, Finnjet collided with a "bigger foreign object" during the first voyage, giving the ship slight damages. After talks with Martin Rogge, who was on board this trip, it can be seen as almost sure that this is a coarse false report!

Finnjet's today's departure was however again 40 Minutes delayed, which was anyway also partly because of the Superfast ferry that needed to pass Finnjet before she could move away from the pier. This assumes anyway that Finnjet was not able to depart in time, as otherwise they wouldn't need to wait for Superfast to pass! :-) Thanks to the gasturbines, FINNJET is at least able to catch up delays of up to 5 hours on the ROS-TAL line with this timetable, therefore a delayed departure is quite unproblematic for the passengers.

FINNJET's misfurtune doesn't stop - First call in St. Petersburg cancelled!
Silja Line appears to be very accommodating

The 6,5 hours delay of yesterday (see below) was cut by 3 hours today, as already published this morning, the Finnjet arrived in Tallinn at 10 PM local time today. The crossing lasted roughly 21 hours and 20 minutes. If there had't been further problems with the rudder steering until this morning, the crossingtime could have been shortened by further 1-2 hours. "Our passengers haven't been in a dangerous situation at any time", Rohrbach declared on board. The risk in continuing the trip to St. Petersburg was mainly the fact that the ship might have not arrived in time to enter the harbour (ships have to enter the harbour in the morning, departures are in the evenings) and that would have been an even bigger problem. Furthermore the Experts from Finland don't have a far way to Tallinn to get the electronics working correctly again. Meanwhile, Silja Line has publsihed a short note on their website about the current situation. Reason given for the delay: Problems with the steering automatic! The continuing trip to St. Petersburg was cancelled. In Tallinn specialists from Finnyards (among others) will check and eventually repair the installations, so that the return to Rostock on Sunday can take place in time and without problems.

The passengers anyway haven't got any reason to be in a bad mood - the opposite is the case! Silja Line pays almost everything for them! All Passengers get free dinner on board including free drinks - as much as they want (!!), already paid vouchers can be redeemed everywhere on board, the continuing trip to St. Petersburg can be made by train tonight, by Silja-Bus tomorrow morning or by Tallink's ferry Fantaasia this evening. Whichever way the route-passengers choose, Silja Line pays the costs. For those passengers continuing their trip to Helsinki, Silja has also got something to offer: The car is parked on board the SeaCat ferry tonight, afterwards one night on board Finnjet in the booked cabin. Starting 05:30 AM tomorrow, which means extra early, the breakfast is served in the restaurants on board. Once more, free of charge for all passengers! The cruise passengers even get one more cruise to St. Petersburg for free!!! It is extremely nice to see how well Silja deals with the situation! On behalf of Martin Rogge I want to laud in particular the work of Silja Germany's CEO Rohrbach on board, who has made the very best out of the difficult situation on board!

Also some changes on the ship can be announced again. For example the steps on the stern sundeck area have been removed, instead you can find 2 small stairs on the left and the right bringing you up to the kiosk (see MMS-photo on the upper left) The new cinema, which is not yet ready to start showing films, has been placed right in front of the photo shop on Deck 6, in direction of the Cabins. New shipplans have been set up everywhere on board. Interesting: On Deck 3 is a "Drivers Club" shown, furthermore cabins 3000-3??? .... Since when does Deck 3 offer passenger cabins...??? We will try to find out what cabins those are :-) Specially interesting appears to me the fact that almost 70% of the vibrations on board could be elminiated (subject to Martin Rogge). The shop on Deck 5 was neither resized, nor does it offer any new FINNJET-merchandising products.

In the cabins you can find welcoming notes like "Welcome on board GTS FINNJET [...] Captains Slotte and Lönnroos and their crew wish you a pleasant voyage". What has happened to Fagerström..? Obviousely he is no longer captain on board Finnjet. Bad news is that a Finnjet-Magazine was not seen on board. Also the panorama bridge is still in it's old shape, the sleep in chairs are also the known ones from the last years. .

Very painful start of the new route: more than 6,5 hours delay

It is already 23:30 Central European Summertime, that means more than 6,5 hours delay already by now, and captain Slotte has still not yet set the ship to move on it's first roundtrip out of Rostock after the renovation in Rauma with about 850 Passengers on board! The start of the new route was muddled badly. The trip was to start at 5 PM, shortly after this time it was said to take place at 6 PM. At 6:15 PM, the bow port was closed and the voyage seemed to be ready to start. But obviousely there were bigger problems! The captain could be seen telephoning hectically on the bridge wing and after some time it was said over the loudspeaker systems, that there are problems with the electronics on board, which should be anyway solved soon. Shortly before 9 PM, it was then said that a specialist was on the way to Finnjet and that the departure could take place in 2 hours. Now it is just said that the departure takes place at night. Now Finnjet hasn't got 24,5 hours to get to Tallinn but less than 18. Not even Finnjet is able to catch this up, even though when driving at full service speed it should be well possible to gain back at least 4-5 hours of the delay easily.

The ship itself offers good as well as bad surprises. According to Martin Rogge, the cabin corridor fittings have not been refreshed and the paintjob isn't yet completely finished on the sundeck, probably because of the rain in the past days. Other works such as some constructions at the toilets of the sleep-in passengers were not yet finished this afternoon either. New is the safety exercise on the outside Deck! The cabins have many good new things to offer, e.g. welcoming candies, "ice cube makers" etc. There are no TVs yet in the Tourist I cabins, but connectors have already been installed!

During the voyage, a german TV-team of NDR is filming a report on board. It will be broadcasted on 8th August in the transmission "Hanseblick" on NDR television programme. One of the Passengers on board is by the way Mr. Pankakoski, the CEO of Silja Oyj Abp in Finland.

On the day before the first trip, a press conference was held on board FINNJET with about 50 guests. Hans-Jürgen Rohrbach opened it in Chef's Dining restaurant together with captain Magnus Slotte and Dr. Ulrich Bauermeister (Rostock Harbour). Most of the questions were concerning the visa-regulations in Russia, but also the ship itself didn't get a raw deal. So, Rohrbach quoted from the book "Gasturbinenschiff FINNJET von 1977 bis heute", which was published in 1997 by Dirk Vesper and Martin Roolvink. The latter was also present at the press date.

After the questions it went on the lunch buffet in Buffet Silja Restaurant, ex. Helsinki Restaurant. An excellent meal was offered, as usual at Silja Line. Marko Stampehl was informed by Slotte, that mostly the new electronic equipment on the bridgewings was the reason to cover them. But also the difficult conditions in St. Petersburg concerning the weather and the navigation were reasons.

At the end, a tour through all public areas of the ship was offered, also cabins were shown from the inside. The whole thing lasted 2,5 hours.

GTS FINNJET: Arrival in Rostock

Photo: GTS FINNJET passing the moles in Warnemünde, 12.06.2004, Antenne MV-Webcam

After an 62-hour Test- and Crossover drive directly from the shipyard in Rauma, the ferry arrived today morning in Rostock punctually. The moles were passed at about 07:37h local time, about 20 minutes later the ship was moored at quay 54. Since there is actually nothing else to report, I'd like to let the pictures speak, additionally I can offer (as always in the past days) a short Webcam-time lapse Video of the arrival.

Photo: GTS FINNJET passing the moles in Warnemünde, 12.06.2004, Institut für Ostseeforschung-Webcam

Photo: GTS FINNJET passing Warnemünde's historical lighthouse, 12.06.2004, Strand-Hotel Hübner Webcam

FINNJET Photos and Arrival in Germany

FIN OIHH FINNJET 54 12.6.2004 07:00 SILJA LINE GMBH

That's what it's like in the expected vessels page of the Port of Rostock homepage. Obviously the arrival is to take place one hour earlier than planned. Meanwhile the first photos of the renovated FINNJET have occured!!! They can be viewed on the Homepage of my Internet-colleague Sami Koski: http://valkeatlaivat04.fateback.com/finnjet1977-6.html.

According to those photos, not only the stern cargate has been lengthened but also the gas turbine exhaust pipes!

GTS FINNJET has left Finland / Conversion completed

After 43 days of dry-docking at Finnyards in Rauma, the ship was undocked on the night between Tuesday and Wednesday. Afterwards the "almost new ship" seems to have parked at a Finnyards-quay for over 12 hours, until it was then shifted shortly after 5 PM to the "RoRo 7" quay in Rauma Harbour. In spite of the short way, Finnjet did not arrive there before 6:05 PM. The remaining stay in Rauma was then very short anyway, lasting only 45 minutes because of a slight delay. At 6:50 PM it was really time to say good bye for all Finns, when Finnjet started the test- and crossover drive to Rostock, which was originally planned to start at 6 PM. Officially Finnjet has left Finland completely now, but many observers don't see a return as an impossible act in the future. As also during the arrival to Rauma, FINNJETweb-Visitors can be glad about a selfmade Video of the departure, which was once again made with Webcam-photos taken from the Rauma Stevedoring OY Webcam! I'm much obliged for this, thank you again.

Photo: GTS FINNJET in Rauma, 09.06.2004, Rauma Stevedoring OY Webcam

And what's new? When it comes to the outer shape, no differences can be seen to the former state, except for the covered bridgewings. For sure, the ship is currently reradiating and glaring like never since a very long time as it was sandblasted and completely newly painted in Rauma! Further optical changes will be probably only visible again on 12th June, when GTS FINNJET arrives in Rostock at 8 AM. With some luck I will even receive some photos of this happening, which will be loaded to this site as soon as possible. Next, 4 days in Rostock are following, in which the new crew will be trained and potential minor remaining works can be finished. And finally, on 16th June is the official press meeting, where agents of travel branche, press and media have been invited. One of those is Marko Stampehl for the magazine "FERRIES". (Whether he will participate or not isn't fully clear yet) In case he will, I'm sure he will also inform me about one or another detail... :-)

During the trip over the Baltic Sea, tests concerning the new bridge equipment, the new bow-thrusters and rudders, as well as the acceleration and deceleration are being made. From 0 to 33 Knots, one complete 360° turn at different speeds etc. are probably parts of the testing-programme on the ferry, so that the regular service starting on 17th June can run without any problems... :-)

Some Dates

GTS FINNJET's Docking and Conversion process will be finished on 8th June, as a Finnyards spokesman confirmed. The ship will be set to swim again and afterwards they have 4 days time to cross the baltic Sea southbound to Rostock, where the arrival is expected to happen on 12th June.

Half time - 3 weeks left to the "maiden voyage"

Photo: Pekka Laakso, 13.05.04

Meanwhile, the preparations for the new route run at full blast. However, there is still contradictory information on the date of first arrival in Rostock: According to the FCBS Forum, the docking ends on 14th June - elsewhere it is said that the arrival to Rostock is already on 12th June. It looks like the first choice is more probable. For sure is, that there will be one or more days where agents of press and travelbranche can visit the renovated vessel in Rostock.

On 17th June the adventure finally starts, when FINNJET departs Rostock at 17:00h local time with 1000 Passengers on board. On the inaugural voyage to St. Petersburg the max. no. of passengers was limited to 1000, to give the crew a chance to get used to the new environment and to guarantee a cruise free of problems and difficulties. As St. Petersburg Times writes, Silja has the intention to extend the service if the new route becomes a success. For 2004, Silja plans to transport only 100.000 passengers on the new route. Current estimations say, that 60.000 people will be Germans and 25.000 will be Russians. As soon as 2005, Silja wants to double the number of russian passengers on board and sell 200.000 tickets in total for the new service. The newspaper reports further that FINNJET is currently booked about 65% for next summer. Of all passengers departing from Rostock, 60% continue their way as far as St. Petersburg, the remaining 40% sail only to Tallinn. Additionally, Silja Line will transport up to 35 cargo units per trip if the cardeck offers still free space.

Investments in the ports of call have been realized. In St. Petersburg for example, roughly 500.000€ have been invested in new check-ins and Terminal equipment. In Rostock, the new terminal building near quay LP60 has been completed as well. Still, worries are currently created by the extension of the quay by 30m. The Warnowquerung GmbH expects negative effects on their tunnel! The completion seems unrealistic for this year and as it looks like, Silja Line will have to use the provisional tents at quay 54 longer than planned.

Good news for all FINNJET-Enthusiasts: Martin Rogge will be on board the inaugural voyage to St. Petersburg as "live reporter" and keep me - and so this site - updated about the current happenings and changes on board with his mobile phone :-)

New Silja Line Brouchures in Germany

Silja Line Germany has published a whole string of new brouchures in combination with the new route, mainly about the topic "city trips". The info papers, which are mostly not more than a folded A3 paper, are available with the following subjects: "Tallinn - Riga", "St. Petersburg - Moscow", "Car roundtrip in the baltics", "Ice cruises with GTS FINNJET", "The 'new' GTS FINNJET and St. Petersburg to get to know", "Tallinn - Helsinki - Stockholm" as well as the prospectus "Nordic Capitals", which advertises combination packages with DFDS and Silja. Additionaly there is a special "titbit" available: The small leaflet named "Combi-voyages with the Finlandships", which was published corporately with Finnlines! Both companies seem to offer in this point for the first time a small cooperation with mutual prices! More information can be found on the homepage of Finnlines Passengerservice : www.ferrycenter.fi. There you will also find the mentioned leaflet as downloadable and printable PDF file!

The 6-weeks conversion process has begun

In spite of the 3 hours delay on Finnjet's departure from Helsinki, caused by a spontaneous labour strike of the engine officers on board, the ship was able to arrive in Rauma harbour just in time at about 12 AM local. The stop lasted almost 3 hours, while the last preperations for the docking were made and several things were transported out of the ship via the stern port. Shortly before 3 PM, the ship started to move with the help of two tugboats, made a 180° turn and sailed slowly to the near situated Aker Finnyards, where she was transfered to the drydock immediately. The conversion has begun! :-)

Thanks to a great Webcam in the port of Rauma (thanks goes to "Rauma Stevedoring OY") I was able to save the images of Finnjet's arrival as well as her departure to the yard, which I then put together to a video. Check out the result via this Link.

The 3 hours delay and the labour strike of the engine officers had (by the way) the consequence, that even Mr. Pankakoski and several other executive offiicers of Silja Line Finland had to come to solve the situation. The reason for the strike was the wish for a clear statement about the future of their jobs on FINNJET.

The "almost new ship" from the inside

In the new finnish Silja Line summer brouchure, the following artist's impressions of the ship's design were shown:

In addition the following text (in finnish): "Finnjet friends will be surely glad during the journey, because our old "lady" has been renovated so extensively that she almost became a new ship. New restaurants, renovated cabins and polished surfaces are more than just a face lift. Now Finnjet is a real international society lady!" The new names of the restaurants and bars and other ares have meanwhile also found their way to the Silja homepage. They are:

Silja Spa, deck 1 (Pool and Sauna area)
Sea Shop, deck 5 (ex. TaxFree shop)
Silja Perfumes, deck 5
Navigator´s pub, deck 6 (ex. Bacchus)
Ocean Club, deck 6 (ex. Paradise)
Casino, deck 6 (ex. Paradise)
Club Stardust, deck 9 (ex. Stardust)
Buffet Silja, deck 4 (ex. Helsinki Restaurant)
Maxim à la Carte, deck 5 (ex. Adam & Eve)
Chef´s Dining, deck 5 (ex. Fiesta)
Seaside Café, deck 6 (ex. Boulevard Café)

Finnjet is on her way...

FINNJET SILJA LINE EK7 26.04.2004 2100 RAUMA

With a 3 hours delay Finnjet left Helsinki today at 9 PM local time and is now on her way to Rauma. Eralier, the ship was mostly "emptied". 2 trucks were going from Finnjet to some warehouse all day long. Mattrasses were brought to the sundeck and transfered ashore by a crane parked next to the ship!

Photo: Sami Koski, 25.04.04

The scheduled arrival time of 12 AM on tuesday will be probably kept anyway. On tomorrow's tuesday's afternoon, the ship will be then shifted over to the drydock, where off-draining will commece once the ship is docked. This water pumping takes about 24h until Finnjet is completely parked on the stands!

The end of an era

Yesterday FINNJET departed for the last time a passenger carrying roundtrip from Helsinki to Tallinn. With a 10-minutes delay the fully booked ship was started to move by captain Lönnroos at 18:10 local time. The trip lasted 3h 33 min from 18:10 until 21:43. The return today was in time as well, at exactly 16:15 local time Finnjet docked at her standard parking position EK7 at Katajanokka terminal.

On board were not just Finns and Estonians but also few continental european passengers wanting to be on board one last time before the renovation starts. For 27 years now, Finnjet has been calling in Helsinki, uninterrupted. Surely all involved people will be a bit wistful, the 1600 passengers same as the 145 crew members. Kari Sillander, the cruise manager on board, wanted to have a small farewell ceremony on the last cruise, so that all officers etc. would appear on the scene in Paradise Bar. Unfortunately the captain didn't want it for some reason and so it was missed.

Right after arrival, works began to remove slot machines and refrigerators off the ship. The works started already during the cruise when the money was removed from the automates on board. Tomorrow, on monday 26th April, these pre-renovation works will be completed and FINNJET leaves for here trip to Rauma at 18:00 local time. Arrival in Rauma is expected in the early morning of Tuesday, 27th April. During the next 7 weeks, she will be marjorly refurbished, while many old parts will be stored in a container in Silja's Stockholm warehouse. The next passengers will enter the ship first on 17th June in Rostock.

2130 sprinklers for better safety and more...

As "Marioff" reports on their website, FINNJET will be equipped with the proven sprinkler system "HI-FOG", to protect areas on board. This does not just include all public areas and cabins, but also the turbine room and the crew areas. In total this means about 2130 sprinklers to be mounted to the ceilings.

Next, "Loipart Ltd." writes on their website that they will be responsible for the conversion of a coffee bar on board on a turnkey base including the galley. Probably this means Boulevard Café!

Renovation news : Cinema and luxury restaurant!

As the finnish newspaper Vasabladet reports, the upcoming renovation will show the following changes for passengers: A new cinema will be built, just as it was exisiting also before 1997. It's place is anyway not yet said anywhere. Furthermore the friends of Commodore Class can be happy: They will get an own luxury restaurant!! Whether it will be placed on Deck 9 or simply the "Fiesta" will get majorly refurbished is still open as well. Additionally it was mentioned that the cabins will get bigger in size and in amount, as well as new stairs on the passengerside, and an "improvement of the maneuvering possibilities" on the technical side.

Surprising turn in the "flag conflict"

As the finnish newspapers Helsingin Sanomat and Ilta-Sanomat reported, italian Flag is no longer a choice for Silja. In fact the negotiations with Finnish Seamen's Union were still running, but still the preservation of the finish Flag semms 90% sure. Same things were also told by a Finnjet-worker in the FCBS-Forum. This decision has anyway no influence on the upcoming crew change on board. Accordingly, Silja has hired 200 workers for the service department on Finnjet from a norwegian crew manning agency. Furthermore it looks now like all employees - not only Officers - of the engine room and the bridge are going to remain on board.

UPDATE: Today, on 17.04.04 Turun Sanomat reports that it has been decided - Finnjet is really going to remain finnish!

FINNJET too old for Italy?

Rumors say, that the italian authority which is responsible for ship registry rejected FINNJET; Reason: Too old! Another possible reason why Silja could be interested in keeping the finnish flag is, that Silja maybe wants to keep the option open to call in Helsinki in the future again with FINNJET without being boycotted by the Finnish Unions.

Russian harbour authority give a reason to worry

Not only Silja Line services St. Petersburg, also Tallink have recognized the signs of the times and are already making experiences. Some days ago the estonian ferry "Fantaasia" was not allowed to transport any cars from and to St. Petersburg, because the queue lanes in the harbour were not painted perfectly, according to harbour officials...! Even though the car traffic is nowadays running again well on the route, general scepticism about the russian authorities is making it's round, for example 2 years ago they reintroduced the vias duty, one day before Silja Line wanted to start cruises with Silja Opera. At least it is still not clear whether german FINNJET passengers will need a visa or not and how expensive it will be. The negotioations are still running and all passengers will get post from Silja once they have found some compromise.

Tallink started the new route Helsinki-Tallinn-St. Petersburg with ferry "Fantaasia" on 1st April.

The Countdown is running!

Only a few weeks remaining and FINNJET will be docked for 7 weeks. The biggest FINNJET-conversion of all times is also connected with a big route change. One may believe it or not, but even on the Helsinki-Tallinn route FINNJET found new friends. So it is actually no big surprise that the last departure from Finland on 24th April is already fully booked. Salomon Kaukiainen talked to an older man on board yesterday, who wants to donate a red rose to every single of the 145 Crew Members! In fact, most of them can soon call it a day. But only most of them, since as it looks like now, all Engine- and Deck-officers are going to remain on board also on the new route. The rest will be replaced by Russians, Philippinos and Estonians.

Changes in rates

The first changes were already introduced in 1997 when Germany was suddenly no longer serviced in winter, autumn and spring. The new German harbour Rostock and the inclusion of Tallinn into the fast timetable marks the next step in 1999. Five years later also the Helsinkians have to say Goodbye - Consequently the new FINNJET Route has nothing to do anymore with the original route of 1977. Because of the massive changes on board and all other factors (new crew, new homeport etc. ) it is well possible to say FINNJET is about to start a "new life"! We should be happy.

Optical changes after renovation

Yesterday evening was Travemünde's Harbour-"Stammtisch" with Silja Germany's CEO Rohrbach having a speech about Finnjet. About 50-60 interested listeners first got an overview of the history of all Germany-Finland ferries combined with Rohrbachs personal biography. According to him, he feels very associated with Finnjet, not just in his function as CEO. He was already in 1974 "commercial leader of the Finland-ships". He transferred one of the legendary Finnjet predecessors, the Ilmatar, to the cruise market after her time between Germany and Finland. (this ship is still exisiting in the USA) Thereby he learned the cruise business from the beginning (planned routes with a circle, arranged logistics in harbours, etc.) Rohrbach has also worked for a french state shipping company and opened a ferry link bteween Panama and Columbia. He was also active in Washington for Commodore Cruise Line. As one can see, it's a very international career.
In 1997 he was first consultant at Silja, until he became Chief Executive Officer. It was his decision to move Finnjet's german destination to Rostock.

Afterwards it was talked about the facts of the renovation and the "new Finnjet": ALL public areas and cabins will be completely refurbished, all cabins (except C-cabins) will be equipped with TVs. Furthermore there will be a new sprinkler system, a new electric steering system, stronger stern- and bowthrusters and new rudders. These have a stronger effect on the propellers and are mandatory to enter the harbour of St.Petersburg. Anyway there were again more wrong than right rumors. New Turbines won't be installed, because it won't be needed to drive at the limit anymore as much as it was needed on the Germany-Finland route. Neither the ship is going to be lenghtened, nor the cardeck will get bigger in any way. Rohrbach noticed: "It's almost going to be a new ship!" Total costs of the docking: 15 Million EUR.

Just as known before, Finnjet will get a new registration country. With 99% probability this will be Italy, according to Rohrbach. Still, the crew will not be italian at all, instead of, the service crew will be a mixed one consisting of Russians, Estonians, Finns, Philippinos etc.

After his one hour lasting speech, Mr. Rohrbach showed a 10mins film about Finnjet and other Silja ships. It was even relatively new! Besides new timetables and brouchures there were also Finnjet-bags for take away and candies in a Finnjet-metal box.

Aker Finnyards to take over Finnjet renovation

The decision has been made. Aker Finnyards will convert Finnjet during the six-weeks docking in May 2004. This was officially announced by Silja Line on Thursday. Besides substantial technical newings, all passenger facilities will be majorly refreshed and refurbished to meet continental trends. For this purpose the Partner Ship Design architect's office in Hamburg was engaged, which is internationally known for it's great interiors and specialised in cruise ships.

Altogether this means in Rauma will be so many working hours completed as one worker works in 100 years with the current working times. No details on the costs of the renovation were given.

The interesting part in the selection of the shipyard is the fact, that Finnyards is the only yard on the Baltic Sea having contracts with Rolls Royce. In addition Finnyards has experience in inserting Turbines of the british manufacturer into ships. (e.g. GTS Stena Explorer). Furthermore Rolls Royce has it's own Azipod propeller factory in the Aker Finnyards yard area, another part of the gossip factory around the Finnjet renovation - We may be curious!

More Information:
>>www.silja.fi
>>www.akerfinnyards.com
>>www.psd.de

Chrismascruise fully booked

Timetable is fixed

First schedule informations appeared

This 2003's season isn't yet completely over and then there are already the first timetable details on the new Rostock-Tallinn-St. Petersburg route available, which starts in June 2004. As it strand on several online travel agencies' homepages the timetables are already completely ready up to May 2005. All Informations I can give you now are anyway "to be enjoyed with special attention", as Silja hasn't so far given any times for the schedules to to the public so far.

As known for a longer time now, there will be up to 2 departures per week in summer, and in winter mostly one. In summer, 12 hours in St. Petersburg, in winter 36 hours. With these facts and with the times shown on the offers-sites I made the following timetable, as it seems to look like at this time!

SUMMER: Finnjet will have a departure in both directions every 4 days.
WINTER: Finnjet will have a departure in both directions every 5 days.

So, the only difference between summer and wintertimetable seems to be the additional day in St. Petersburg in winter. Finnjet will need for Rostock-Tallinn and Tallinn-Rostock 26 hours, Tallinn-St. Petersburg will then last 16 hours, St. Petersburg-Tallinn however 19. This way the whole trip from Rostock to St. petersburg takes 38 hours, and St. Petersburg-Rostock 41 hours. It looks, like Finnjet will have a lying time of 5 hours in Rostock throughout the year. So, the average speed needed is just 19,5 Knots on the ROS-PET route and 18,1 Knots on PET-ROS. Anyway, between Tallinn and Rostock will be needed 21,3 Knots in average.

Renovation 2004 - St. Petersburg

Else than this year's planned drydock visit Silja doesn't have any other chance than realizing this one in May 2004. In the german newspaper "Norddeutschlands Neuste Nachrichten" the Silja CEO was asked about it and gave some facts about the renovation and the new tiematble. Finnjet will have a laying time of 12 hours in St. Petersburg in summer and 36 hours in winter. Per week, 2 departures in each directiion are scheduled, and there shall even be already 15000 prebookings. For the upcoming truck and trailer transport, Silja seems to want to bigger the catdeck up to 750 lane meters. How this is to be done is anyway not mentioned in the report. Furthermore in the 1.5 months lasting "comprehensive rejuvenating cure" Finnjet will get new rudder systems, new sprinklers, but no new Turbines. However all passenger areas will be refurbished, the "Robert's Coffee" finally finished and all cabins extensively renewed. A new paint is of course also mandatory and will also come, but this time for the whole ship! (No panic: The current moon-like area won't get worse as they will surely sandblast the areas to get the paint and roast off.. ;) )

Also about the passenger processing the colleagues of NNN weren't remained uninformed. It is planned to remove the temporary tent areas and replace them by the old fruit terminal, which is to be rebuild to a Passengerterminal with a direct gangway to Finnjet's entrance at Deck 5.

Six-month numbers: Slight decrease on Finnjet

This isn't a big surprise either. Already in June Hans-Jürgen Rohrbach let the press know that June will be a weak month concerning passenger and car loads on the Finnjet, since there have been holiday time movings made in Germany, causing some Families to be only able to go on vacation later. He also stressed that July and August would be much better booked than still in 2002. This is also standing in Silja Line's current half year numbers, which were released on the 14th August. As only real surprise can be called the cargo units. 45 cargo units only in June, that's more than in whole 2002. However, i don't know any good reason for that... A cancelled Superfast voyage or a new interest of Silj in cargo transport could be reasons for that, even if that was actually planned to start not before 2004. No doubt, 45 cargo units is still "peanuts", but for Finnjet and compared to the years before it's a lot...

The final FINNJET marketing has begun

As known for already a longer time Finnjet will completely stop servicing Finland in 2004, and so there started to be these ads some days ago in the finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat. Freely translated the slogan means "You've got the last chance to travel from Finland to Germany by Finnjet! Only a few departures left!" However the big "good bye" will be just in April for the Finns, when also the winter Duty Free service stops and the ship goes into the dock. That's probably the reason why the big PR actions won't take place at this time (if Silja will do something at all..).

In the same newspaper was however also an interview with Silja Germany's head Mr. Rohrbach. Projectleader Finnjet let the Finns know, that also after the route change Silja will fight hard for Finnish customers. As example it will be free to get to Tallinn with Silja's SuperSeaCats if the trip continues to Rostock by Finnjet. In Tallinn you will find a Transit area, so that it will be possible to move over to Finnjet from SuperSeaCat directly without any passport controls. This will even be possible for cars.

FINNJET released for "Virtual Sailor" (Sail- and Motorboat Simulator)

For all virtual Sailers and Captains (to which I can also count myself ;)) out there is now finally again a ray of hope about Ferries. Jürgen Klemp has fortunately created a FINNJET 3D Model and published it as freeware AddOn for "VS". The ship can be downloaded via www.vsshipyard.tk. Sure, the dynamics and textures of the ship are still quite unrealistic in this release, but I have made some corrections to them and will probably release and update together with Jürgen Klemp soon. (Notice: All Screenshots have been made with the new textured model)

Thanks to the "Between 3" Scenery of G. Lurz Rostock Warnemünde is even very well outfitted in "Virtual Sailor". About Helsinki and Tallinn it's therefore quite weak, which is the reason why Salomon Kaukiainen and I are currently working on a scenery for this region... More Infos to come ;) If you want to know more about "Virtual Sailor" and download a free Demo you may be interested in the offiicial Homepage.

The Screenshots show the vessel in Warnemünde.

ZDF reports about FINNJET

The Second German Television (ZDF) has created a very nice report on the sailing of 1st August from Rostock to Tallinn and back, which was already shown on the 09th August in the emission "Länderspiegel"! For all those, who missed the report or would simply want to see it again, ZDF offers an article and even a webstream on it's site. Further advantage: This report is, else than in "Länderspiegel" complete, in TV they seemed to have a lack of time. The article with Videolink can be found here (new window opens automatically)

http://www.zdf.de/ZDFde/inhalt/0/0,1872,2058496,00.html

In own business

This year I'll be on board GTS FINNJET on 23rd (ROS-HEL) and 31st (HEL-ROS) of July. Just in case someone else is also on board on the same dates, he could maybe contact me :)

(By the way: I haven't still yet managed to get a bridge or turbinehall visit so far...)

Fundamental decision with consequences
no more Finland, Germany all year

!

Finnjet's future will change drastically on 1st May 2004. Starting this date, Finland won't be served at all anymore. The new route to be serviced starting 14th June 2004 looks like this: Rostock-Tallinn-St. Petersburg v.v. Furthermore Finnjet will be registered to another country in or out of Europe. It won't be neither Finland nor Sweden. (e.g. cheap flag Bahamas...) The new route will need 38 hours oneway and will be offered twice a week. This route shouldn't be seen as a replace of the current Helsinki-Tallinn traffic in winter, but as a YEAR ROUND service. In other words, one of tha last traditions will be broken and Finnjet leaves Finland totally. (For Finland Tourists there will be anyway the possibility to change over to the "SuperSeaCats" in Tallinn that will take you to Helsinki in 1,5 hours.) Whether the name of FINNJET will remain isn't sure either.

Huge renovation

Sure is, that Finnjet will have it's docking period which was planned for this year in May 2004. Accordingly, the Helsinki-Tallinn taxfree-traffic stops at 30.04.2004 fitting with the joining of Estonia to the EU. Afterwards Finnjet will get a renovation it hasn't seen for a long time. Ca. 1,5 months it will take, to realize this huge rebuild. There isn't known any detail, however you can be sure Silja Line will renovate the things at least which were already planned to be done this year (Boulevard, Bacchus, NEW TURBINES). In addition, Silja Line will make Finnjet fit the new route, so in final you can expect Finnjet not be the same it was before the renovation.

The ball is in Germany

Silja Line Germany has now got more power than ever before. Not just that the current Finnjet-Projectleader Leena Lahdenperä won't have to do anything anymore in 2004, being replaced by the current CEO of Silja Germany Hans-Jürgen Rohrbach; the german part of Silja also got more room to play. FINNJET won't be finnish anymore; neither by the new Registry, nor by the route and also not by most of the future passengers.

Silja has given up! - Has Silja given up?

Silja Line has played out it's competitors with this clever draw. But one could say in the same way Silja has given up the fight against Superfast and will now move to a different route. Because of the removing of the Tax-Free some route had to be found, all year competition to Superfast would be the financial ruin because of the much higher efficiency of the Superfast ships. Furthermore another traffic to Finland in the winter time would bring no profit for anyone. On the Rostock-Tallinn route Silja would be actually competition-less, same on the Tallinn-St.Petersburg Line. Experts prognosticate a high growing potential for traffic from and to St. Petersburg and Tallinn. There's benefiting that the land connections are in poor condition and generally bad between these cities.

For Rostock and at all Silja Germany it's sure that there will be improvements. There are currently tries to get or build a terminal in Rostock. This way Silja will also be present in Rostock all year, which will add some jobs. For Finns this is going to be the end of an era, not last therefore it was the main topic of the finance news on all finnish stations on 13.05.2003.

THIS IS THE LAST GERMANY-FINLAND SEASON WITH FINNJET! So if you'd like to cruise with this ship in it's unique slight 80s-style through the harbourentrance of Helsinki for the last time outbound Germany, you will have to do so until 7.9.2003. At this date will be the last departure from Germany to Finland with GTS FINNJET.

In 2004 everything will change

Silja Line's supervisory board has decided

The day before yesterday is probably going to be a milestone in the history of Finnjet. The articles we have seen about the lenghtening of the season and a possible traffic to St. petersburg can now be read as officially confirmed. The german newspaper NNN reports, that Finnjet will serve one more harbour on it's route starting 2004; namely St. Petersburg. (In this moment we all remember what was said in 2001, Finnjet wouldn't be able to pass the thin canal into that harbour) Furthermore the paper writes that Finnjet will extend it's "radius of actions over the borders of the season." In connection to the year round Germany traffic it doesn't say anything actually, so we'll see how the situation developes.

26 Years FINNJET

Yep, it's (already) again so far, Finnjet got one year older and becomes 26 years on 13th of may. Even though the 10 days docking planned for today was recently cancelled, one can say in general the news are better this year than in 2002 and the future prospects also look better now with the all-year Germany route planned for 2004. (btw, I expect the docking only to be moved to another date, for example when the lenghtened season begins. So in this way it was a very logical and consistent action) However,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY FINNJET!

In own business

FINNJETweb - For more than 2 years and 3 months my little site about Finnjet is existing now. There were easy times, hard times and those when I wasn't able to update the site at all, like now since January. The more it is a real honour for me to have passed the 20.000 visitiors mark now. Thank you very much to all who visited this site, even when there were no updates. Unfortunately I'll have to make a small backdown concerning the update intervalls. I'm also just a pupil and have a lot of other things to do now, so please, dear visitors, show understanding when there can't be always an update. At least the site keeps being actively working, me too, but however, surely not as often as before. Did I express myself gentle enough? ;)

News from the may-docking

The Drydock visit in may get's more interesting everyday! Besides Boulevard Café there is also Bacchus going to be completely renovated and the Turbines will have 9 MW more power than the current ones and save on the same way 1/3 of the fuel of the old turbines. As the new turbines will be by Rolls Royce (see below) I checked out their homepage to look for a turbine meeting those needs. Thereby I found the MT30, it would have with 36 MW "only" 8,5 MW more than the FTC4C turbines currently installed on Finnjet and with 0,207kg/kWhr just 25% less fuel need, but still it is very close. More informtion about the MT30 of Rolls Royce can be found here.

For your information: The name of the engineer on board telling that Turbinechanging story is "Ville Grönlund".

New Turbines in may?

Silja Line is alleged to plan to exchange Finnjet's turbines by more modern economic ones in may 2003. That's what an engine officer is alleged to have said to Cornelia Klier (Finnjet-Friend), what she again has told Salomon Kaukiainen (Finnjet-Friend), and finally he told me (Finnjet-Friend ;) this also. According to the officer the turbines are running quite well, but they just use too much fuel and have too low efficiency. Furthermore the servicing costs have rised rather extremely, so for an example the whole time spent in Helsinki during the overnight stop in summer from Monday to Tuesday was used (and needed) to service systems like airconditions. Planned are Rolls Royce Turbines, some of those models could bring up to 25% fuel savings comapred to nowadays' 26 year old Pratt & Whitney Turbines. Already 1977 special attention in the construction of the Finnjet was taken to ensure the possibility to change out the turbines later by more modern economical ones. Unfortunately there were never actions taken to change out the turbines, as in general gasturbines are known as too expensive and the risk of the not available savings was too high. But this time it looks somewhat else and it would at least guarantee the further service of Finnjet for Silja Line for some longer period. It's also a further sign showing Silja Line wants to leave the Tallinn-TaxFree&drinking tours, the more so as Estonia will become EU in 2004 very probably and with this the Duty Free Bonus would expire. I do not know what Silja will do, also I don't know whether it's true with the turbines but I think if they tell it already the engine officers it should be as trues as possible. Let's hope for the best and wait for further news!

Christmascruise ended !

Lucky 10 minutes too early Finnjet docked today at 10:51 to Helsinki, so now the 5 days cruise to Travemünde is over. Later on Finnjet had to be shifted to the cruise quay as otherwise it would have blocked the pier for Cinderella. In the evening the first regular Tallinn cruise started again and they will be normal route until 11.5.2003, after that it's time for a drydocking.

As a small summary I made a Special with Photos, Data and Videos from the trip!

Silja Line HP, Brouchure and Fares

Stop in Travemünde successfully dispatched!

FINNJET arrived in Travemünde today at 9:35 and left again at 16:02. So, Finnjet called for the first time since 1564 days it's old "second homeport". But this time was not used Quay 6 but quay 3, which also has advantages concerning Webcams :) About the success of the trip can be argued, as only 600 people were (are) on board. This could be a reason making it the last time to call Travemünde. Next stop is at 27th december 2002 at 6:15 CET in Tallinn and later at 10 o'clock CET on the same day the cruise is completely over in Helsinki.

And this: "Nils Nordenbrink" made 2 great photos of FINNJET on her way to Travemünde from Gotland on 24th december 2002 at 12 o'clock. I don't want to put them to my site without asking (I don't know his email adress) but I can set a link to them anyway. ( If you should read this, Nils, please send me an email!)

I made several webcam photos and even videos, also from other legs of the trip. Those will be on my site when the cruise is over.

Gotland photo1 ~ Gotland photo 2