Training sailing ship Mircea

Mircea is a three-masted barque, built in 1938 in Hamburg by the Blohm & Voss shipyard as a training vessel for the Romanian Navy. Her design is based on the successful plans of Gorch Fock; the last of a series of four sister ships. The ship is named after the Wallachian Voivode, Mircea the Elder. After World War 2 she was temporarily taken over by the USSR, but later returned to Romania. In 1966, she was overhauled by Blohm & Voss.

On 3 July 1939, Mircea left for her first training voyage in the Mediterranean Sea, stopping at the ports of Palermo, Toulon, Palma, Gibraltar, Algiers and Alexandria. The last part of the voyage, which included visits to Syria, Cyprus and the Greek Islands, was canceled because of the German attack on Poland. Thus, on 3 September 1939, Mircea returned to Constanța where it was docked at the military berth.

The outbreak of the Second World War would mean the beginning of a long period, over 25 years, in which Mircea did not execute any long voyages representing Romania outside the Black Sea. For safety, on 19 February 1941, the ship was docked at Brăila on the Arapu arm of the Danube. She stayed there until the summer of 1944. In September 1944, she was taken by Soviet authorities. Two years later, on 27 May 1946, she was returned to the Romanian Navy.

Between 1946 and 1947, the ship went through some repair works, mainly on the masts. The training voyages resumed in 1947, though only short ones in the Black Sea. In 1964, the ship participated in festivities on the Romanian Navy Day. On this occasion, it was decided that Mircea should be repaired and modernized.

In 1965, she went through a powerful storm while traversing the Bay of Biscay on her way to Hamburg, nearly running aground at Chaussée de Sein. On 19 January 1966, the ship, together with its tugboats, arrived at Hamburg where on 24 August the repair and modernization work started. It returned to Constanța on 7 November 1966.

On 4 July 1976, Mircea participated in the Grand Parade of Sailing Ships of the United States Bicentennial at New York. Between 1977 and 1994, the school ship Mircea performed voyages on the Black Sea and Mediterranean Sea, according to the plans of practical training of students, but also of representation.

On 4 October 1994, modernization works were carried out at the Brăila shipyard, which were completed in 2002. In 2004, she participated in the «Tall Ships Challenge — 2004». In the following year, the ship received numerous invitations to participate in various events. Thus, she participated in the festivities of the 175th anniversary of Belgium at Zeebrugge, in the festivities of the National Day of France at Cherbourg, she participated in the «Tall Ships Race 2005», in the «SAIL Bremerhaven 2005» at Bremerhaven and at the «SAIL Amsterdam 2005» festival in the Netherlands. In 2007, Mircea participated in «The Tall Ships Races 2007». The Mircea school ship also participated in other international regattas: «Black Sea Tall Ship Race Regatta 2014» in the Black Sea, «The Tall Ships Races 2017» in the Baltic Sea, «The Liberty Tall Ship Regatta 2019» in the English Channel and North Sea.