History
Pride of Dover was the last new ship to appear in service with the famous Townsend Thoresen orange hull, although she was delivered with the P&O house flag painted on her funnel in place of the traditional 'TT' insignia. Townsend Thoresen was renamed P&O European Ferries late in 1987, following the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster, and Pride of Dover was swiftly repainted in the new company colours.
Pride of Dover primarily operated the Dover–Calais route, but on a number of occasions made crossings between Dover and Zeebrugge as a result of industrial action in France.
The industry generally regarded Pride Of Dover and her sister Pride of Calais as the most successful ferries ever built for English Channel service. The ships boasted superb handling characteristics and excellent sea-keeping abilities. Between 1998 and 2002 she was under the control of P&O Stena Line and carried the name P&OSL Dover from 1999 until 2002. Once returned to P&O control she was renamed PO Dover before she was repainted into new P&O Ferries livery when her name returned to Pride of Dover.
The vessel ended her P&O service on 15 December 2010 with her last crossing leaving Dover at 2345 local time. She was replaced by the new superferry Spirit of Britain, with a bigger capacity and almost double the gross tonnage, at 47,600 tons, the largest ferry to cross the channel. Pride of Dover was laid up in Tilbury Docks and offered for sale. In February 2012, her house flag was removed from her funnel, but she remained in warm lay-up in Tilbury until 23 October 2012, when Pride of Dover was put into cold lay-up. All her generators were switched off and her skeleton crew was transferred to her sister, Pride of Calais, which was laid-up in Tilbury on that day.
On 1 November 2012, almost two years after she had been laid up, Pride of Dover, with her engine damaged beyond repair, was sold for scrap to German shipping interests. Her name was changed to Pride and all her P&O logos were removed. On 29 November, she left Tilbury for Tuzla, Turkey under tow by Eide Fighter.
Read more about this topic: MS Pride Of Dover
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