Lone Ranger's work done in Bermuda

WEDNESDAY, FEB. 1: The research vessel Lone Ranger has left Bermuda after a five-month stay bound for the Bahamas.

The ship has been tied up off Ordnance Island in St George’s since she arrived on August 10, 2011.

A small crew has been living on board the vessel since, and in the last week a team of scientists has arrived in Bermuda to join them.

The Lone Ranger was originally constructed as an ocean tug in Germany in 1973.

After two decades of industrial and commercial service she was refitted in Malta for global expedition yacht operations.

She has a cruising range of 30,000 nautical miles.

Circumnavigated

Between 1994 and 2009 Lone Ranger circumnavigated the globe several times and visited both the Arctic and Antarctic regions.

In 2009 Schmidt Ocean Institute received the Lone Ranger as a donation and reconfigured parts of the vessel to support ocean research operations.

The ship left Bermuda on Monday morning bound for Freeport in the Bahamas and her next ocean research mission.

As the research vessel left the island the more familiar bow of the Oleander was just arriving in Hamilton.

She left Hamilton yesterday morning.

Tomorrow sees the arrival of the other two container ships; Caribe Legend and Bermuda Islander.

This is likely to be the last we see of the Caribe Legend before she is replaced by the Somers Isles again.

Both the Caribe Legend and the Bermuda Islander will leave on Friday.