Built in Bolnes, she is powered by one 1200hp Deutz diesel engine, producing a service speed of 12 knots.
Sofrana Line took her on charter from her Dutch owners for service on the Noumea run, and her initial calls were under her original name, "Josephine".
Warner Pacific purchased her in September 1980, and she arrived at Onehunga from Tonga on the 22nd, sporting her original name. When she sailed on 2 October, it was mere hours after having been renamed "Sami", in honour of Sami Totau, a nineteen-year-old crewman who died in a fire aboard the Warner Pacific Line ship "Kemphaan" on 11 June 1978, when the ship was under way from Timaru en route to Apia, Vavau and Nuku'alofa.
She underwent a further name change to "Sami II" in 1983, presumably to avoid confusion with another vessel of the same name which had previously visited Onehunga.
She was broken up in Kaohsiung in September 1988.
|