Status:Broken Up- 19.08 2022 | Last Ship manager & Owner: BLUE ORIGIN FLORIDA LLC 8082, Space Commerce Way, Merritt Island FL 32953-2411, USA|
Flag:Marshall Islands|Call Sign:V7A2085|*"STENA FREIGHTER" From stellar future to scrap. When Amazon founder Jeff Bezos bought the ro/ro ship Stena Freighter four years ago, it was to convert the ship into an advanced landing craft for the space company Blue Origin's rocket New Glenn. The ship was named after Bezos's mother - Jacklyn - but the conversion was suddenly stopped. There was a prospect of a credible future for the 183 meter long vessel, when after having served Stena for 14 years - primarily on routes in the North Sea and the Baltic Sea - in 2018 was sold to Blue Origin.
The Bezos-owned space company had big plans to convert the ship into an autonomously sailing landing craft for the New Glenn rocket.
Work then also started, but stopped again earlier this year before the giant platform where the rocket New Glenn was supposed to land was mounted. Blue Origin confirmed that plans for the ship had been scrapped, without giving a further explanation.
Blue Origin considered other uses for the ship, but according to employees at the port of Pensacola in Florida, where the ship has been moored, so many modifications had been made that it was not realistic.
So instead of having to pick up rockets for Jeff Bezos, the old Stena ship was towed away on Monday on its final journey to be scrapped - presumably at a shipyard in Brownsville, Texas.