OT­TO CAR­RING­TON

Se­nior Re­porter

The MV Blue Wave Har­mo­ny is con­firmed to ar­rive in Trinidad and To­ba­go on Thurs­day af­ter­noon, as fi­nal prepa­ra­tions are made for its in­tro­duc­tion in­to the in­ter-is­land sea bridge ser­vice.

Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Jear­lean John said the ves­sel’s agent is al­ready in Trinidad and To­ba­go and has held meet­ings with of­fi­cials from the Port Au­thor­i­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go (PATT) and the Na­tion­al In­fra­struc­ture De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed (NID­CO).

She re­peat­ed the com­ments this morn­ing at the Amer­i­ca cham­ber of com­merce Out­look on the econ­o­my event at the Hy­att

The roll-on/roll-off car­go and pas­sen­ger ves­sel has been char­tered to re­place the MV Cabo Star, whose lease ex­pired ear­li­er this month.

The Gov­ern­ment moved quick­ly to se­cure a re­place­ment to en­sure con­ti­nu­ity of es­sen­tial car­go and pas­sen­ger trans­port be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Dis­cus­sions have been cen­tred on staffing for pas­sen­ger cab­ins, cater­ing ser­vices, berthing arrange­ments, and car­go load­ing plans—all of which are be­ing fi­nalised ahead of the ves­sel’s ar­rival to sup­port a smooth tran­si­tion in­to ser­vice.

As part of the prepara­to­ry process, the agent is sched­uled to trav­el to To­ba­go to­day to con­duct an on-site as­sess­ment of the Scar­bor­ough port ramp, a key re­quire­ment for the ves­sel’s load­ing and un­load­ing op­er­a­tions.

Of­fi­cials say the Blue Wave Har­mo­ny will pro­vide in­creased car­go ca­pac­i­ty, en­hanced re­frig­er­at­ed stor­age, and im­proved pas­sen­ger ac­com­mo­da­tions, in­clud­ing cab­ins and on­board ameni­ties, of­fer­ing a more re­li­able and com­fort­able sea bridge ex­pe­ri­ence.

The ves­sel is al­so ex­pect­ed to im­prove op­er­a­tional re­li­a­bil­i­ty, with up­grad­ed sys­tems and built-in re­dun­dan­cies de­signed to re­duce me­chan­i­cal down­time—a long­stand­ing con­cern for freight op­er­a­tors and trav­ellers.

With the ar­rival date now con­firmed, au­thor­i­ties say fo­cus has shift­ed to fi­nal op­er­a­tional readi­ness, crew co­or­di­na­tion, and port as­sess­ments ahead of the ves­sel’s first sched­uled sail­ings.

The Blue Wave Har­mo­ny is ex­pect­ed to en­ter ser­vice short­ly af­ter ar­rival, pend­ing fi­nal reg­u­la­to­ry clear­ances and port tri­als.