10 vessels of the BOSTON and STEPNICA-CLASS (5 of each) are in the process of having their bulbs cut off at the Chinese Qingdao shipyard. The objective is to save 5% fuel as the bulbs instead of reducing drag at the design speed of 25 knots or more actually increase drag at the lower speed of the slow steaming mode.
MAERSK BUFFALO and MAERSK BALTIMORE have already had the cut, and have now been Danish registered with the names of SEAGO BREMERHAVEN and SEAGO ANTWERP indicating that they will now be serving the European short sea strings of SEAGO LINE.
So what have we now: the most powerful coasters in the European waters ! Especially sad to see the BOSTON-ships reduced to nothing. Apparently they have even had some new paint on the funnels.
For a photo check
www.maritimedanmark.dkFor more photos of the process go to the last line of the text and click "HER" - which actually means "HERE"
Niels
Correction: Still some noses around. On
www.maerskline.com go to the flickr-logo. The comments to some of the 11 photos indicate that new redesigned low-speed noses have been added to the ships. By the way a lot of interesting photos on the Maersk Line Flickr in case you should not have noticed yet.