Celtic Link Ferries in Serious Trouble. Is a closure imminent?

seanmacc

An extract from the Sunday Times. Sorry I can't link but they're not online.

CELTIC LINK FERRIES, which operates between Rosslare and the French port of Cherbourg, is being circled by several creditors. They include Rosslare Europort, which has filed a petition to wind it up over an allegedly unpaid €100,000 port bill. Celtic Link, part-owned by the O'Flaherty business family in Co Wexford, is being sued in a €4m dispute with a French ferry company, Louis Dreyfus Lines (LD Lines), over a 2009 charter agreement. LD Lines
impounded Celtic's main vessel, MV Celtic Horizon, in Cherbourg at the end of May this year, holding it until cash was lodged with a French court. Celtic Link, which had accumulated losses of €7.8m at the end of 2010, recently had a €45,000 judgement registered against it by a UK supplier. Two other companies controlled by the O'Flahertys, KQ Shipping and Weissford Shipping, went into liquidation in November, owing €6.2m.

The article then goes on to say how Celtic Link are being sued by Irish travel company Celtic Horizon Tours over trade mark infringement. Celtic Link apparently didn't do their homework properly when they named their new ship Celtic Horizon. That won't come cheap either. William O' Leary (of O'Leary International fame) who owns 50% of the company insists "But we are a healthy company that will be here long into the future"

The winding up motion will be heard on July 30th. If a wind up happens here there will be a couple of winners as the market consolidation of shipping in Ireland becomes ever closer and the cartel ever more obvious.

tricky D

Link to scan of article:

http://www.pdfhost.net/index.php?Action=Download&File=8337d8a34f629792e66eb90f76a45461

mattthemiller

This story turned out to be pure and other tripe... Only went last week. New website now too..