1. The Company is the original operator to the Isle of Wight and has a distinguished and colourful history spanning over 146 years. The Company's famous house flag was derived from the names of four steamers that were in the newly merged fleet in 1861- Sapphire, Emerald, Ruby and Pearl.

2. One of two identical sisters ordered in 1993, the Raptor class as they were known, were a doubled-ended design with a central bridge affording excellent all-round visibility. There was no centre casing to impede loading and deployable mezzanine decks could be deployed in various configurations to improve flexibility.