On March 19 this year, the Karstensen shipyard plant in Gdańsk hosted the first launching of a naval vessel.

So far, the Karstensen shipyard has built and launched hulls and fully equipped vessels at its plant in Gdynia. Last year, however, the company purchased the site of the former Gdańsk Shipyard along with the infrastructure located on it, thanks to which its capabilities have significantly increased. Moving from Gdynia to Gdańsk is a process spread over time.

– Ultimately, the entire production will be transferred from Gdynia to Gdańsk in the middle of the year. Ultimately, about 700 people representing various specialties will work here – Bartłomiej Kopczewski, deputy director of the shipyard, told us in March.

The area to which the Karstensen shipyard is moving has two slipways that will enable spectacular ship launches. The first launching using the slipway is initially scheduled for September, but today, May 19, the first launching took place at the new shipyard in Gdańsk. The fishing vessel Polarbris was launched by flooding the dock.

Polarbris is a 43.5-meter fishing vessel with a width of 11.5 meters and a tonnage of 900 GT. The trawler has an ice class, and the construction was supervised by the DNV classification company. The ship can develop a speed of up to 13 knots and can accommodate 12 people on board. Karstensens Skibsværft A/S design office was responsible for the project, and the ordering party is the Norwegian company Polarbris AS, Kjell-Gunnar Hoddevik & co. Polarbris is due to be handed over to the customer in August. The vessel's home port will be the Norwegian Ålesund.