M.F. KARELIYA

Black Sea Shipping Company (BLASCO)

Soviet Union, Ukraine

 

Chantry Classics postcard. Photo by W.H. Moojen.

 

Built: 1976 by Oy Wartsila AB, Turku Shipyard, Finland as a cruise/car ferry.

Technical:  

Overall length: 156.2 m

Beam: 22.0 m

Draft: 5.9 m

Gross Tonnage: 15791 tons

Passengers: 660

Power: 2 Pielstick-Wartsila diesels

Service Speed: 21 knots

Operating Routes: Used to make Odessa based European/Mediterranean/World cruises. She is operating worldwide now, mostly under charter to various companies (CTC, Peace Boat, etc...)

Sister Ships: M.F. Belorussiya, M.F. Azerbaydzhan, M.F. Gruziya, M.F. Kazakhstan.

Former Names: None

Later Names: M.S. Leonid Brezhnev (1982), M.S. Kareliya (1989), M.S. Olvia (1996)

Owners:
- 1976-1995: Black Sea Shipping Company, Odessa, Ukraine.
- 1995-1996: State formed Maddock Trading, Odessa, Ukraine.
- 1998-Present: Kaalbye Shipping International (K&O Cruises?), Odessa, Ukraine.

History and Current Status: Between 1976 and 1995, she sailed under the hammer and sickle of the Black Sea Shipping Company (BLASCO) of Odessa. In 1995, after the collapse of BLASCO, she got transferred to Maddock Trading, a company partly created by the government of Ukraine to own the vessels of the former BLASCO. This operation caused some lawsuits. In 1998, she was transferred to the Odessa based Ukrainian company Kaalbye Shipping International and she has been chartered by various companies since. M.S. Olvia is presently (Dec, 2001) chartered to the Japan's Peace Boat Organization, that organizes worldwide educational cruises out of Japan.

(email all info about her to ata.bilgili@dartmouth.edu)

Notes: Named after the Soviet Republic of Kareliya, she used to make frequent stops at the port of Istanbul, although I cannot call her a regular due to her worldwide cruising schedule. For reasons I do not know, I somehow took great pleasure in seeing her, even more than M.S. Belorussiya. Probably her being an occasional sight played a role on that. She was easily identifiable because of the additional structure on her bow, just below the wheelhouse. She is the only ship between her sisters that has this addition. Unfortunately, I have no photos of hers that I took. I guess whenever she was there, my camera was not!... Shame!...

Links:

- Aleksi Lindstrom's M.S. Kareliya page.
- Micke Asklander's M.S. Kareliya page.
- Jan Tiedemann's M.S. Kareliya.
- Frederick Bartoli's M.S. Olvia.
- Manos Petridis' MS Olvia.
- Expedia.com's MS Olvia page.

Line Drawings:From the book "Soviet Bloc Merchant Ships" by Bruno Bock and Klaus Bock, 1981.

Other Pictures: