BC's 'white elephants go for peanuts

摘要

Another chapter was written last month in the painful and pricey saga of the largest aluminum catamaran ferries ever built in North America. The three 122 meter PacifiCat car ferries, owned by BC Ferries, were sold March 24 at an unreserved international auction in Vancouver, Canada, by Ritchie Brothers Auctioneers for $13 million (about C$19.23 million). Essentially the three ferries were bought for pennies on the dollar of their original construction price. The winning bid for the three ferries was from an unidentified North American. The auction, which took about 10 minutes, reportedly drew participants from the U.S., Canada, Singapore, China and United Arab Emirates. The word prior to the auction was that the ferries could wind up operating in Indonesia.