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04 December 2004 RODRIQUEZ FORMALLY
HANDS OVER NEW CATAMARAN TO LAURO SHIPPING The ceremony took place in the port of Fiumicino, Italy, due west of Rome and was attended by a wide mix of guests including journalists, shipyard representatives, shipowners and politicians, the latter reflecting the fact that Lauro’s patriarch is Senator Lauro, a sitting politician in the Italian parliament.”. This location was chosen as it will serve as the departure point for Lauro’s new high speed route to the Ponza island with their new catamaran, the “Maria Celeste Lauro”. She will be followed next year with two further catamarans presently under construction at Rodriquez. The “Maria Celeste Lauro” is CityCat 40 catamaran, yard number 341, i.e. 40 m LOA, 10.5 m beam, 320 passenger high speed vessel that achieved more 35 knots during sea trials from her two Caterpillar 3516B diesel engines. The vessel is fitted with anti-pitch T-Foils located well forward to maximise their effectiveness and to minimise the pitching motion. There are also the well-proven “Intruders” fitted to the transom to provide for longitudinal adjustment of the trim whilst greatly reducing resistance increasing reaction time compared to traditional systems. Further technical details can be found in the attached documentation. The vessel is built to RiNA class and is fully HSC 2000 compliant.
Passengers are distribute on two decks with the main deck being for economy class who have a snack bar at their disposal and the upper being a more upmarket business class area. All internal areas are fully temperature controlled with television monitors throughout and a complete sound system to add to the passenger comfort. As is typical for such vessels operating in the Med, loading is primarily via two aft ramps that have been designed to be quickly and easily deployed. There is also a small bow door for the rare occasions that a bow loading will be necessary. In the past four years, Rodriquez has been heavily focused on diversifying their production range having developed a full range of fast ferries including catamarans to complement their industry leading fast monohulls and hydrofoils. This is in addition to their entry into the military and yacht sectors along with their most recent work with RoRo and RoPax ships. These efforts have been rewarded with current contracts for 55 ships with a total value of Euros 400 million. Production of these ships is spread amongst Rodriquez’s five shipyards, four in Italy and one in Brazil.
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