There’s a little Elbe treat in July – on July 15 (next MONDAY), the new heavy lift vessel UHL FABLE will be christened off Baakenhöft in the Port of Hamburg. 150 meters long, blue hull, high, white superstructure and two massive, red 450-ton cranes. They can handle quite a lot.
A total of 139,980 liters of paint were applied. With a splash of anti-fouling to prevent algae from forming on the underwater hull, so that the sea creatures don’t slow down the journey and unnecessarily increase the UHL FABLE’s fuel consumption.
On its first voyage from China (Tianjin and Dongzhao) to Cuxhaven, the ship was bringing rotor blades to Cuxhaven for a Danish wind turbine manufacturer. It looked enormous – white blades stacked close together, the rotor tips carefully taped red and white so that nothing would break on the almost 25,000 km long sea voyage.
The new ship, known as the F900 Eco-Lifter, belongs to the Hamburg-based heavy lift shipping company United Heavy Lift (founded in 2015), which is based in HafenCity and already has 19 of these environmentally friendly “ships of the future” in operation.
The heavy-lift cargo ship with Captain Karsten Strotmann on the bridge is due to arrive in the port of Hamburg in time for the European Championship final. Naturally unloaded and spruced up for the christening on Monday, where there will also be a confetti cannon. And because people speak Low German in the port, singer, actress and speaker Annie Heger (NDR 1, “Hör mal ‘n beten to”) will be the presenter. Accompanied by a genuine shanty choir from Stade.
Shipowners Andreas and Lars Rolner have already rolled out the long red carpet at Baakenhöft. And so that everyone can be right up close, the naming ceremony will be streamed live by a drone ballet in the hopefully blue harbor sky. However, the blue barge also copes well with the term “liquid sunshine” coined by former port captain Pollmann to describe the typical Hamburg port weather.
Watch without GEZ fees: The naming ceremony will be accompanied by a publicly accessible livestream. Shipping enthusiasts can watch it from 12.15 to 13.45 (Hamburg local time) at this link: https://unitedheavylift.de/uhl-fable/
