History
Condor Express was built in 1996 at the Incat Yards in Tasmania, Australia for use by Condor Ferries then joint owned by Commodore Shipping of Guernsey and Holyman. Condor Express was the first of a series of four 86m catamarans.
Condor Express arrived in her home waters from her builders in January 1997 and was opened to the public in Poole before taking up service between Weymouth and the Channel Islands later that month replacing Condor 12. On 1 March 1997, Condor Express opened the Poole-Channel Islands service for Condor Ferries after operating what was planned to be the last sailing from Weymouth for the company the day before. Condor Express' first year in service was marred by a series of technical problems resulting in delays and cancellation of what was now the only car and passenger ferry service to the Channel Islands. As a result of these problems the governments of Guernsey and Jersey put the licence to operate the service to the United Kingdom out to tender. Since this time Condor Express' engines have been modified along with those of her sister ships and she now provides a reliable service between the UK and the Channel Islands though she is now based once again in Weymouth year round with seasonal services from Poole. As part of a bid to improve service as part of the tender agreement Condor Express and her sister Condor Vitesse were fitted with a Club Lounge and an area of reclining seats.
Condor Express received an updated version of the Condor Ferries livery in 2003.
In August 2005 Condor Express briefly ran on the Brittany Ferries Poole-Cherbourg service. She had been experiencing technical problems and so Condor Vitesse was transferred to the more taxing Channel Islands service. During this time Condor Express did not sail to St Malo instead running an afternoon roundtrip to Cherbourg to ensure she would return to Poole in time for the 07:30 Brittany Ferries departure time. Condor Express ran once again for Brittany Ferries on 19 May 2008.
Read more about this topic: HSC Condor Express
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“History ... is, indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.
But what experience and history teach is this—that peoples and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“History is the present. That’s why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product, myth.”
—E.L. (Edgar Lawrence)
“The thing that struck me forcefully was the feeling of great age about the place. Standing on that old parade ground, which is now a cricket field, I could feel the dead generations crowding me. Here was the oldest settlement of freedmen in the Western world, no doubt. Men who had thrown off the bands of slavery by their own courage and ingenuity. The courage and daring of the Maroons strike like a purple beam across the history of Jamaica.”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)