Orca I Departs Baltimore July 8, 2019
This 294x32m (963x106ft) container ship matches the dimensions of the Carnival Pride and was built in 2006 by Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries in Mokpo, South Korea and is owned by Athens, Greece based Technomar Shipping according to BalticShipping.com. However, according to this Hellenic Shipping News article she is actually owned by Global Ship Lease and has been leased to Maersk as of June 2019 at the rate of $9,000 per day for the first 12 months and $10,000 per day thereafter.
The question of who really owns this 5,095 TEU, 330 reefer plug ship becomes clear in this October 29, 2018 press release from Global Ship Lease announcing a merger with Technomar’s parent company, Poseidon Containers. According to this Fourth Quarter 2018 Results press release she had previously been leased to ZIM. This press release is additionally interesting because an eye opening list of daily charter rates is included.
I did not find any news or video on this ship (other than my own, below). However, I did find this video by Dru Shipyard (company not linked because the website has autoplay audio) about a different kind of ship with the same name. The Indonesian text below the YouTube video is shown translated below courtesy of Google Translate: “ORCA I is a patrol vessel ordered by the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (KKP) to PT Daya Radar Utama. This ship is one of the four ships of the Indonesian Fisheries Inspection Ship System (SKIPI) built by the Ministry of KKP to national shipyards.”
In the first scene of my video below it can be seen she is nearly devoid of containers contrasting very sharply with the Maersk Shenzhen in the background. One wonders if this has to do with her being newly leased last month. In the second scene the tugboat Lynne Moran can be seen waiting an inbound ship. Because she is riding so high out of the water her bulbous bow is visible and the rudder is showing just behind the splashing produced by the action of the propeller. As she continues on the Patapsco River towards the Chesapeake Bay she can be seen passing the much more loaded container ship Agios Dimitrios.