Profits Surge at Blue Star

Profits Surge at Blue Star

From Mail & Guardian Online (www.mg.co.za) 

At least 50 people are dead and 148 others are missing after a coastal ferry capsized overnight Friday in rough seas off northern Sierra Leone. A ports authority official in the capital said the boat was heading from Freetown to Rokumi village when it ran into a storm. The vessel, named Amunafa and powered by outboard motors, regularly ferries goods and people between Sierra Leone's coastal towns and villages. At the time of the accident, it also had, in addition to the 200 passengers, 300 huge bags of rice on boardFrom Lloyd’s List (www.lloydslist.com) 

Blue Star Maritime, the Attica Group-controlled holding company for Blue Star Ferries of Greece, said profit in the first half of the year increased over 50%. Profit after taxes and minority interests rose to €9.56m after the company achieved improved load factors and higher revenue yields. 

Introduction of the ferry Diagoras last August on routes to the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea saw an increase in the number of passengers, vehicles and freight traffic carried on these routes. Blue Star said a contributing factor to the improvement in results was an increase in yield per passenger and vehicles carried on routes to both the Dodecanese and Cycladic island groups. A 46% reduction in the number of sailings between Greece and Italy also improved the volumes carried and revenue per sailing on Adriatic Sea routes. Load factors on the company’s Scotland to Belgium route also reached "particularly high levels’’, the company said. 

Blue Star said it will continue to examine the development of new routes and the strengthening of existing ones both at home and abroad through the acquisition or building of modern conventional vessels. The company said it is in contact with shipyards for building new vessels.