The Romanian Navy training ship Mircea visited the Grand Harbour once again on Saturday, 9th of July 2022. The friendly officers & cadets welcomed us onboard and gave us a tour around the wooden decks of this beautiful ship.
The vessel was conducting a training voyage around the globe, for young Romanian Navy Cadets. Mircea was built at the German shipyard of Blohm & Voss in Hamburg back in 1938 and was commissioned in 1939.
She is a three-masted Barque ship and is the 4th out of 5 sister ships, named after Mircea the Elder who ruled Wallachia at the end of the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century and is also known for his rebellion against the Ottoman Empire in 1394.
The old timer survived World War II as she was mainly sailing in the Black Sea. She was taken by the Soviet Union for 2 years, between 1944 & 1946. Then she was given back to the Romanian Navy where she has been operating ever since with a remarkable 83 years of service.
Mircea is 82 meters long with a beam of 12 meters and a draught of 5,2 meters and can accommodate 210 people onboard.
She is propelled by a diesel engine with a power output of 809 Kw when she is power driven or by 3 masts with a total of 23 sails when sailing.
