Cruise ships
A poorly asked question from the PNV and misinterpreted by the Government freezes a tender on the remodeling of a second-hand 50-footer
A poorly formulated question to the Congress Table by the PNV spokesman, Aitor Esteban, and very misinterpreted by the Defense Minister, Margarita Robles, has triggered the Spanish Government to stop a tender for a sailboat, which the Spanish Navy was coming managing for a long time.
It was a second-hand 50-foot sailboat, with an ORC division hull and the deck of a modern TP 52, and it had been designed in this way to save the 3 million that a new generation Transpac 52 costs. The Navy did not want a new ship at any time, what it wanted was to optimize one of the ones on the market and adapt it to the ORC Division.
The misunderstanding has been that both the PNV and the Minister have assumed that the 50-footer was for the use and enjoyment of King Felipe, and it is necessary to clarify to the PNV and the Minister, in the ignorance of both, that all the ships of sail of the Spanish Navy are from the Naval Regatta Commissions and are used for the education and training of the crews that are in the naval sectors at all times.
The King, who is the Head of State and Captain General of the Spanish army, is also the highest authority of the Spanish Navy, so he can use any of the ships that it has in its possession. The current “Aifos” is the last ship that the Navy acquired, an old TP52 of hers is already 20 years old, so it is up to her to go to the reserve. She has also raced in the “Sirius” saga and in the “Hispania” maxi, and at no time has anyone thought that these boats were her property.
What’s more, King Felipe has been racing in the “Aifos” for a few years only in the Copa del Rey in Palma de Mallorca during his vacations, because his schedule does not allow him to do it on more occasions, but the “Aifos” sails in other regattas the controls of Jaime Rodríguez Toubes, who is the skipper of the ship, as for example in the Queen of Valencia Trophy.
The Spanish Navy ships are owned by the Navy itself, have a skipper designated by the Naval Regatta Commission, a helmsman, and a crew, which in some cases can be joined by retired sailors or civilians, but the ship, to information from the PNV and the Minister, has no other owner than the Ministry of Defense itself, which is the one who pays for it.
The Spanish Navy is one of the great incubators that Spanish sailing has always had, from which great cruise, Olympic and ocean sailors have come, and of course King Felipe, who has been haggling on ships of the Naval Commissions since he was 15 years old. of regattas. They currently have a total of 43 boats distributed between the Naval School of Marín and the Naval Regatta Commissions of Ferrol, Cádiz, Cartagena, the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands.
