The ''Hansa'' class is a class of four

ro-pax Roll-on/roll-off (RORO or ro-ro) ships are cargo ships designed to carry wheeled cargo, such as cars, motorcycles, trucks, semi-trailer trucks, buses, trailers, and railroad cars, that are driven on and off the ship on their own wheels or using ...

ferries A ferry is a ship, watercraft or amphibious vehicle used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water tax ...

originally built by Stocznia Gdańska,

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

for

Finncarriers Finnlines Plc ( fi, Finnlines osakeyhtiö, Oyj, sv, Finnlines Abp) is a shipping operator of Roll-on/roll-off, ro-ro and passenger services in the Baltic Sea and the North Sea. It is a subsidiary of the Grimaldi Group. Finnlines’ sea transpor ...

Poseidon Poseidon (; grc-gre, Ποσειδῶν) was one of the Twelve Olympians in ancient Greek religion and myth, god of the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses.Burkert 1985pp. 136–139 In pre-Olympian Bronze Age Greece, he was venerated as a ch ...

service. Following a merger of Finncarriers and Poseidon to

Finnlines Finnlines Plc ( fi, Finnlines Oyj, sv, Finnlines Abp) is a shipping operator of ro-ro and passenger services in the Baltic Sea and the North Sea. It is a subsidiary of the Grimaldi Group. Finnlines’ sea transports are concentrated in the Bal ...

, all ships of this class came to be owned by Finnlines. As of 2013, three ships (''Finnpartner'' and ''Finntrader'') are operated on Finnlines' routes connecting Finland and Sweden to Germany, while two ships (''Euroferry Sicilia'', ''

Euroferry Olympia The ''Euroferry Olympia'' is a operated by the Italian Grimaldi Lines, in service since 1995. The ship operated as ''Transeuropa'' in the Baltic Sea by the Finnish shipping company Finnlines until November 2013. The new owner Grimaldi operated the ...

'') sail with Grimaldi Ferries in the Mediterranean.

History

The ''Hansa''-class ships were built mainly as freight-carrying vessels, but they also provided a daily passenger-transporting service between Finland and Germany, in direct competition with , a former Finnlines ferry then owned by

Silja Line Silja Line is a Swedish-Finnish cruiseferry brand operated by the Estonian ferry company AS Tallink Grupp, for car, cargo and passenger traffic between Finland and Sweden. The former company Silja Oy—today Tallink Silja Oy—is a subsidiary ...

. Originally all ''Hansa''-class ships were used in traffic from

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

Lübeck Lübeck (; Low German also ), officially the Hanseatic City of Lübeck (german: Hansestadt Lübeck), is a city in Northern Germany. With around 217,000 inhabitants, Lübeck is the second-largest city on the German Baltic coast and in the stat ...

. The first ship of the class, MS ''Finnhansa'', was delivered on 3 August 1994, with MS ''Finnpartner'' following on 12 February 1995, MS ''Transeuropa'' on 31 May 1995 and MS ''Finntrader'' on 26 October 1995. The three Finn-prefixed ships were owned by Finncarriers and registered in Helsinki while ''Transeuropa'' was owned by Poseidon and registered in Lübeck. Following a series of mergers between companies owned by Finnlines and brand simplification, in 2000 the ownership of all the ships passed to Finnlines. In 2001 the German terminus of the route was changed to

Travemünde Travemünde () is a borough of Lübeck, Germany, located at the mouth of the river Trave in Bay of Lübeck, Lübeck Bay. It began life as a fortress built by Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony, in the 12th century to guard the mouth of the Trave, an ...

. Following the delivery of new ships for the Helsinki–Travemünde service in 2006 and 2007 MS ''Finntrader'' and MS ''Finnpartner'' were taken off the Finland–Germany service and rebuilt at

Remontowa Remontowa (full name: Gdańska Stocznia "Remontowa" im. J. Piłsudskiego S.A.) is a company and shipyard in Gdańsk, Poland. The yard specialises in ship repair and conversions. ''Remontowa S.''A. is one of 26 companies that make up the Remontowa ...

, Poland with bow gates and additional cabin spaces. After the refit, on 19 February 2007, ''Finntrader'' began service on Finnlines'

Malmö Malmö (, ; da, Malmø ) is the largest city in the Swedish county (län) of Scania (Skåne). It is the third-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm and Gothenburg, and the sixth-largest city in the Nordic region, with a municipal populat ...

–Travemünde route. At the same time the ship's homeport was changed from Helsinki to Malmö and her original cream/green colour scheme was changed to Finnlines' while/blue. ''Finnpartner'' was rebuilt with similar modifications and joined ''Finntrader'' on the Malmö–Travemünde service in July 2007. In April 2009 ''Finnhansa'' was sold to Grimaldi Ferries (who have the same parent company as Finnlines), and entered service on their

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the List of cities in Italy, sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian ce ...

–

Catania Catania (, , Sicilian and ) is the second largest municipality in Sicily, after Palermo. Despite its reputation as the second city of the island, Catania is the largest Sicilian conurbation, among the largest in Italy, as evidenced also by ...

–

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

service under the name ''Euroferry Sicilia''. Despite this change of ownership the ship at least initially retained its cream/green Finnlines livery with Finnlines company markings.

References

External links

*
M/S ''Finnhansa'' (1994)
at ''Fakta om Fartyg'' *

at ''Fakta om Fartyg'' *

at ''Fakta om Fartyg'' * {{in lang, sv}

at ''Fakta om Fartyg'' Ferry classes Ships built in Gdańsk