One of a class of four ships built at Harland & Wolff of Belfast,  they were the last of a long line of ships to be built for Blue Star Line and known as the Harland Class. With four fully refrigerated hatches and fitted with "Banana doors" they are a versatile class of ship. With modern hydraulically operated poppet valve 2-stroke B&W engines, 4 x Allen Alternators, J&E. Hall screw refrigeration compressors and fully automated machinery operation they are well thought out ships.

With the sale of Blue Star Line to  P. & O. Nedlloyd in February 1998, they were retained within the Vestey organisation and were operated by Star Reefers a combine of Hamburg Sud and Albion Reefers. In July 2001 the Group announced that Star Reefers, operating a fleet of 24 ships had been sold to Norwegian Owners. The Norwegian Owners forged a joint operation with the Japanese NYK Group, and a new company, NYK Star Reefers Ltd.
This has now become The Star Reefers Group based in the Cayman Islands with offices in Norway.

During November 2004 the English Star underwent major steel renewals in way of the fore peak tank and elsewhere about the shell plating at Nantong Shipyard, China . Apparently she is still in good mechanical condition and has a few more years left in her, evidenced by the massive refit in progress.