The day began with a tree planting ceremony at Tongzhou Forest, symbolizing growth, unity and new beginnings, followed by the steel cutting, initiated by Robert Corley, Chief Operating Officer of Mercy Ships, marking the first major step in the ship's construction.

Guests at the ceremony included Mr. William Zhou, President of GSI (Guangzhou Shipyard International); Robert Corley, Giuseppe Gargiulo, Head of Newbuilding at MSC Group; and Daniela Picco, Executive Director of MSC Foundation, the main sponsor of the newbuilding project, alongside representatives from each partner organization.

Once completed, the TBN: AFRICA MERCY II will be one of the world's largest civilian hospital ships. Measuring 174 metres in length, 28.6 metres in breadth, and featuring 12 decks, the vessel will accommodate up to 644 volunteers and medical professionals.

The ship's hospital will include six operating rooms, 98 acute care beds, 86 low care beds, and seven ICU/isolation beds, significantly expanding the organization's surgical and training capacity. The project is being realized through collaboration among international experts representing five continents, combining world-class maritime engineering with a global humanitarian mission.

As part of this effort, Deltamarin has been responsible for the development of the vessel's concept design in close cooperation with Mercy Ships, and for the preparation of approval design documentation for the yard. Mercy Ships took in 2021 delivery of the newbuilt hospital ship GLOBAL MERCY from China State Shipbuilding Corporation's (CSSC) Tianjin Xingang Shipyard.

At the time, Swedish Stena RoRo was a central partner in the newbuilding project, in which Deltamarin also took part. The project was based on a design derived from a never-realized Stena-developed "Stena Seabird" class of RoPax vessels.

AFRICA MERCY II is based on the same design and will therefore, in effect, be a sister ship to GLOBAL MERCY, despite the two ships being built at different shipyards. Mercy Ships' current second operational hospital ship is the AFRICA MERCY, built in 1980. This former Danish railway passenger ferry, which was phased out from the Great Belt crossing when the fixed tunnel and bridge connection opened in 1997, has served as a hospital ship for Mercy Ships since 2007.

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