Quest Nav revealed its plan to introduce the never delivered Singapore laid-up Norman Leader between Yarmouth and Portland if the company is selected by the NS government to operate the route. Nova Scotia administration issued a tender in November after years without ferry link since last operator (Bay ferry) stopped in 2009.
Quest Nav will operate the ferry as the NovaStar and expect it can be operational this summer.
Singapore Technologies Engineeries, the Singapore based shipbuilder, terminated a contract with LD Lines. The contract involved the construction of a cross Channel ferry, to be called the Norman Leader, that should have cost $180 million.
LD Lines said in a statement that the yard had not responded to demands specified in the order. The company says capacities of the vessel would not have corresponded with those specified originally and that a delay in the construction also had prompted LD Lines to cancel the order. The yard will refund LD Lines $129 million and it will refund a further $15 million under certain conditions.
The Ferry is Still tied up at the builders yards in Singapore.
Quest Nav has contracted Maritime Holdings Group (MHG) of Hollywood, Florida, to manage the crewing and hotel operations on Nova Star. Since 1992, MHG has operated 12 cruise and ferry vessels around the world. MHG currently operates four passenger ships: Pinar Del Rio and Maverick, two high-speed ferries operating between south Florida and the Bahamas; Ola Esmeralda, a 500-passenger cruise vessel in the Caribbean; Ocean Dream, a 1,200-passenger cruise vessel, which sails on three 100-day, round-the-world cruises each year from Yokohama, Japan.
The Other respondee to the tender is Maritime Applied Physics Corp. They manufacture several designs for hydrofoil fast ferries. These would likely not be in compliance with the tender, and would probably suffer from similar limitations to the CAT.
