Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Displaying items by tag: Rainbow

The ongoing broadcasting of the National Lottery TV advert-campaign 'Making Magic Happen' depicts an impressive 'man-made rainbow' display on the River Liffey, which was created by a pair of new tugs, a helicopter and the rising sun, writes Jehan Ashmore.
During a mid-summer morning, onlookers witnessed the spectacle created as the Dublin Port Company's new tug-sisters, Shackleton and Beaufort arrived close to the Sean O'Casey Bridge and the Convention Centre. In tandem the tugs fired 2,200 gallons of water reaching to heights of 70 metres and a throw of 95 metres. In fact the highest 'water fountain' reached some 10 metres above the equivalent height of nearby Liberty Hall.

The spectacular effect of the life-size rainbow had never been achieved before in Ireland. Steve Green, the director of the advertisement used a 35mm film, with footage from HD cameras, including one mounted on the helicopter which hovered over the 'new' landmarks of the 'Docklands'.

The imaginative advertisement was created by Sweet Media, the production company chosen to produce the campaign, under the direction of the National Lottery's advertising agency, DDFH&B. The soundtrack for 'Making Magic Happen' is the appropriately titled 'Pocketful of Rainbows', sung by Elvis Presley. The version used is Take 16 from the 1960 recording sessions for the 'G.I. Blues' soundtrack.

As for the stars of the advert, the tugs are named after Irish figures, Shackleton, named in honour of Antartic explorer Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton and Beaufort, named after Navan-born, Sir Francis Beaufort, who created the world-renowned wind-scale measurement.

The 50-bollard ton tugs cost €6m each and were built at the Astilleros Zamakona Shipyard, Bilbao. In March the tugs officially entered service after a joint naming ceremony was held in Dublin Port.

To view the tugs in water-firing, making magic mode!... click the link here

Published in Dublin Bay

About Brittany Ferries

In 1967 a farmer from Finistère in Brittany, Alexis Gourvennec, succeeded in bringing together a variety of organisations from the region to embark on an ambitious project: the aim was to open up the region, to improve its infrastructure and to enrich its people by turning to traditional partners such as Ireland and the UK. In 1972 BAI (Brittany-England-Ireland) was born.

The first cross-Channel link was inaugurated in January 1973, when a converted Israeli tank-carrier called Kerisnel left the port of Roscoff for Plymouth carrying trucks loaded with Breton vegetables such as cauliflowers and artichokes. The story, therefore, begins on 2 January 1973, 24 hours after Great Britain's entry into the Common Market (EEC).

From these humble beginnings however, Brittany Ferries as the company was re-named quickly opened up to passenger transport, then became a tour operator.

Today, Brittany Ferries has established itself as the national leader in French maritime transport: an atypical leader, under private ownership, still owned by a Breton agricultural cooperative.

Eighty five percent of the company’s passengers are British.

Key Brittany Ferries figures:

  • Turnover: €202.4 million (compared with €469m in 2019)
  • Investment in three new ships, Galicia plus two new vessels powered by cleaner LNG (liquefied natural gas) arriving in 2022 and 2023
  • Employment: 2,474 seafarers and shore staff (average high/low season)
  • Passengers: 752,102 in 2020 (compared with 2,498,354 in 2019)
  • Freight: 160,377 in 2020 (compared with 201,554 in 2019)
  • Twelve ships operating services that connect France, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain (non-Covid year) across 14 routes
  • Twelve ports in total: Bilbao, Santander, Portsmouth, Poole, Plymouth, Cork, Rosslare, Caen, Cherbourg, Le Havre, Saint-Malo, Roscoff
  • Tourism in Europe: 231,000 unique visitors, staying 2.6 million bed-nights in France in 2020 (compared with 857,000 unique visitors, staying 8,7 million bed-nights in 2019).