Die deutsche Kühlschifffahrt - German Reefer Shipping. Karsten Kunibert Krüger-Kopiske

merged its reefer ship activities with the Japanese NYK under the name NYKLauritzenCool. With Lauritzen’s complete withdrawal from reefer shipping in 2007, the organisation was renamed NYKCool. NYK then sold this engagement in 2014 to Russian interests, which continue to run the shipping business as Baltic Cool until today.

      Built at Gdanska Stocznia SA in Poland in 1994, DOLE AMERICA is also a European product and also part of a quartet. With 523,000 cbf, this ship is slightly larger than the reefer vessels built for Hamburg Süd at the same time, which can be considered her near-sisters.The DOLE AMERICA and her sisters have been sailing under her christening name for the Dole Group since entering service.

      It is not difficult to see that the CHIQUITA DEUTSCHLAND (IMO No. 9015187), like the JORGEN LAURITZEN, was also built in Denmark in the early 1990s. The ship and its three sisters is with 645.000 cbf however somewhat smaller. Since 2014 this series is operated in the Sea-trade-pool and taken over by Seatrade as from 2019.

      The COSTA RICAN STAR (IMO No 9150822) is a ship of a series of four, built at the Japanese Shikoku shipyard in 1997/1998 and is still in service with the Star Reefers today belonging to the Norwegian Siem Group. With 564.000 cbf they belong to the bigger ships. In addition, the ships can stow 374 TEU containers on deck. It should be noted here that containers — including refrigerated containers — are not counted as capacity in “cbf”.

      The STAR STRATOS (IMO No. 9350991), built in 2007, is a relatively modern refrigerated ship and part of a series of eight ships built at the Shikoku shipyard in Japan. The cargo capacity of the vessel employed in the Star Reefers Pool is 617,000 cbf. The ship, which was built for Japanese account and has been owned by a Singapore company since 2019, now bears the name CS STRATOS.

      Under IMO No. 9666481, the Kyokuyo shipyard in Japan delivered a special ship in 2013, as it is extremely cool and does not need ballast water for stability. All in all, the ship is not particularly large at 284,000 cbf and is used for transporting frozen goods.

      The four refrigerated ships of the ORANGE-class were built in 2018/2019 at the Guangxin Shipbuilding Yard in China. With 312,000 Cbf they are not very large and with 14 knots not very fast either. Their speciality is, above all, taking frozen fish from the fishing fleets on the open sea in order to bring it to the port of destination. For this purpose they have the ideal loading gear and are equipped with Yokohama fenders.