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This ship was designed for service on the UK Safmarine service, between the UK and South Africa, but replaced in 1986 by a slightly larger and more powerful ship which was built at the same German shipyard and received the same name.
The newer ship is now in service with Cruise & Maritime Voyages and still named ' Astor ' !
Based on ships previously sold by Saga Cruises, and the age of this ship, she could now be heading to the breakers unless a lot of updating is done to meet all the latest solas regulations !.
quote:Originally posted by Neil - Ex P & O & PRINCESS CRUISES:This ship was designed for service on the UK Safmarine service, between the UK and South Africa, but replaced in 1986 by a slightly larger and more powerful ship which was built at the same German shipyard and received the same name.
Totally wrong!
This ship was built in 1981 by a German investment group that introduced her in December 1981 as the Astor, a small luxury cruise ship. The firm was called Hadag. They planned her to run in Europe as a cruise ship not the Safmarine service. In fact, her owners included a large German tobacco company so the funnel was designed to look like a pack of cigarettes!
They ran her for two years before she was sold in February 1984 to Safmarine!
Safmarie only ran her for a year before they realized it was a big mistake. She was not capable of running the run to South Africa. They quickly resold her and ordered the replacement which was more powerful.
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