Dutch shipwrights are building a replica of the famous schooner Atlantic. In 1905 under command of the renowned captain Charlie Barr, the original schooner set the record for a transAtlantic crossing from New York to The Lizard at 12 days, 4 hours and 1 minute. A monohull record that would stood for 100 years.

Designed by William Gardner, the original was launched on July 28th 1903. Since the launch of the black steel hull at the Van der Graaf Yard on 15 March 2008, work has been progressing steadily.

Deep down in her engine and pump room the Yanmar engine and generators have been fitted and the engine has been aligned. Hundreds of yards of pipes and tubes have been installed under the main floor. The deep wine glass shape hull gives her bilge standing headroom over 30 metres length, which makes life for the plumbers below actually quite comfortable. All bulkheads and separation walls are in place and litterally miles of cable have disappeared through it all. The bowthruster is in place and hooked up. All in all, the progress on the system side is on schedule.

On deck, the progress is the most obvious. Atlantic is the first large yacht taking full advantage of the new fingerjointing technology in which the Royal Boogaerdt company near Rotterdam has specialised. This new technology provides for an incredibly beautiful and uncluttered teak deck, where all boards are invisibly joined to lengths of 13.20m. At Absolute Projects in Portugal the deck hardware has been recreated using original plans and photographs. Meanwhile the Harken company went out of their way to manufacture 36 all bronze custom winches in the style of the bygone days.

The first of the three masts is completed. The immense spars will stand almost 50 metres tall. Both the lower and the top masts will be made of alloy and the booms and gaffs will be built in Sitka spruce. As early as 2007 the required volume was secured in Alaska and cut to very exacting specifications.

Once fitted out, the schooner will be rigged and prepared for a delivery passage to the south of France in spring. There the finishing is expected to take another year.

The schooner measures 56.43 meters (185′) over the bows, excluding bowsprit and mizzen boom outboard of respectively 8.76 meters (28’8) and 4.05 meters (13’3). With her beam of 8.85 meters (29′) and draft of 5.00 meters (16’5) her displacement is 395 tons. From the different sail plans of the original, the record setting 1905 rig of 1,720m² (18,500 square feet) has been chosen for the recreated yacht. The building takes place under Bureau Veritas classification for charter yachts and the yacht will be MCA certified.

Though not yet fully finished, Atlantic will be sailing again soon. And no doubt she will have a crack at beating the time the original yacht made to cross the Atlantic in 1905.