Hull Plating News

LOTOS Petrobaltic, an ORLEN Group company, signed a contract for the construction of a Crew Transfer Vessel (CTV) with Singapore-based Strategic Marine, set for service in the Polish offshore wind market.The StratCat 27 CTV is scheduled to be completed this summer, with delivery to Europe planned for early September 2024.This CTV will join the existing fleet managed by Miliana Shipmanagement Limited, a company belonging to the LOTOS Petrobaltic capital group, which owns five offshore…

Singaporean shipbuilder Strategic Marine reports it has secured an order to construct a newbuild crew transfer vessel (CTV) for the Polish offshore wind sector.The order comes from LOTOS Petrobaltic S.A., an ORLEN Group company, and will see the new vessel—a BMT-designed StratCat 27—delivered to Europe in September of this year.This CTV will join the fleet managed by Miliana Shipmanagement Limited, owned by the LOTOS Petrobaltic capital group, which owns five offshore vessels.

American shipping companies are spending more than $120 million to repair and maintain their fleets of Great Lakes bulk carriers this winter.The fleet of U.S.-flagged ships, known as "lakers", can move more than 90 million tons of cargos annually, including iron ore, stone, coal, grain, salt and sand. Each year after the shipping season draws to a close, these vessels enter shipyards and repair facilities around the Great Lakes for a period of winter maintenance and repair. This…

Gladding-Hearn Shipbuilding, Duclos Corporation, has delivered a Chesapeake Class pilot boat to the Bermuda Government, Department of Marine and Port Services. It follows delivery of a 61’ pilot/rescue vessel to the port services in 2011.The new all-aluminum launch is certified to Lloyd’s Register class and replaces a 10-knot steel pilot boat built by the Somerset, Mass. shipyard in 1980. With a deep-V hull designed by Ray Hunt Design, the new boat measures 52.11’ overall, with a 15.10’ beam and a 4.8’ draft.

The U.S Coast Guard has awarded Vigor Alaska, a Titan company, a $3.65 million contract to perform maintenance and repairs on U.S. Coast Guard Cutter John McCormick at the Ketchikan Shipyard.Work on the project begins this week and will cover comprehensive maintenance and repair of the vessel. After USCGC John McCormick is dry docked, the team at Ketchikan Shipyard will inspect the hull plating, conduct maintenance on the ship's propulsion system and renew hull coatings, as well as several other key maintenance and repair operations.

A barge owner’s lack of inspection and maintenance led to the capsizing and sinking of a crane barge last year in the Gulf of Mexico, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said.The crane barge Ambition was being towed when it capsized and sank on June 15, 2022, releasing an estimated 1,980 gallons of oil. No injuries were reported. The Ambition, owned by Rigid Constructors, and its crane were a total loss estimated at $6.3 million.Due to the height of the crane, the Ambition was being towed offshore in the Gulf of Mexico to reach its destination.

A new icebreaking tugboat built by Blount Boats in Rhode Island has been delivered to the New York Power Authority (NYPA) to work in the Niagara River to help alleviate shoreline flooding and reduce the likelihood of ice limiting the power production at large hydro plants along the Niagara River. The Breaker II joins a fleet of three boats that work every winter to install the Lake Erie—Niagara River Ice Boom—a series of 22 spans of steel pontoons that straddle the mouth of the…

With thousands of miles under her keel ferrying passengers from Woods Hole, Mass., to the private island of Naushon, part of the Elizabethan Island chain south of Woods Hole, the Comorant just underwent a four-month refit at Gladding-Hearn Shipbuilding, which built the vessel in 1979. Pret Gladding, a co-founder of the Somerset, Mass.-based shipyard, designed the 56 ft., 49 passenger ferry for the Naushon Island Trust. The Cormorant is the year-round lifeline to this small island community…

On  July 11, 2019, Damen Shipyards Den Helder signed a midlife upkeep (MLU) contract with the Netherlands Ministry of Defense. With this contract, support ship HNLMS Pelikaan, along with hydrographic survey vessels HNLMS Snellius and HNLMS Luymes, all of the Royal Netherlands Navy, are heading to Damen Shipyards Den Helder for an  maintenance and modernization.The scope of work that the Damen yard will perform will include equipping the vessels with new hull plating, renewal of radars and communications equipment and maintenance the ship’s systems…

Underwater repair specialist Hydrex says when hull damage leads to the classification society to only allow temporary repair, there is a practical solution that allows ships to continue operations until a permanent repair can be scheduled. Recently called upon to inspect damage to the stern thruster area of a 195m ro-ro ship during a scheduled stop in Antwerp, the Hydrex investigation revealed a large crack in the welding seam on the edge between the hull plating and the thruster tunnel. To repair the vessel, Hydrex was able to fabricate a 600mm x 300mm doubler plate, on-site.

More than 440 tons of heavy fuel oil was extracted from the tanks of the sunken general cargo vessel Thorco Cloud. The wreck lies in two sections 1,730 meters apart and 70 meters down in the middle of the eastbound traffic lane of the Singapore Strait following a collision in December 2015. The heavy oil in the fuel tanks and in trapped compartments was seen as a major pollution hazard. Both the bow and stern sections contained fuel tanks that required emptying, so the Thorco Cloud’s owner, Marship GmbH, supported by the P&I insurance company Standard Club, contracted Jaya Salvage Indonesia early last year. Bumi Subsea provided remotely operated vehicles (ROV) and the dynamically positioned Surf Allamanda, owned by Bourbon Offshore.

Subsea Industries’ Ecospeed hull protection system has been selected for RRS Sir David Attenborough, the polar research ship under construction at the Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead, Liverpool, U.K. The £150 million contract to build the vessel, which Cammell Laird won in 2015, represents the biggest commercial shipbuilding contract in Britain for 30 years. The ship has been commissioned by the National Environment Research Council (NERC) and will be operated by British Antarctic Survey (BAS).

New York’s Lake George Steamboat Company recently commissioned API Services to laser scan the hull the oldest boat in its fleet, the 107-year-old Mohican. The original Mohican, in service from 1894 to 1907, was a 93-foot wooden hull vessel. The ship was replaced in 1907 by a steel-hulled vessel christened the Mohican II in the summer of 1908, thus beginning the first of her 107 years of continuous service on Lake George. This naming convention also began the custom of reusing names of former lake boats, which survived until the construction of the Lac du Saint Sacrement in 1989.

Hydrex has an in-house Research & Development department that can take care of the engineering aspects of an operation. In this way turnkey solutions can be offered for complex hull and other repairs that require the construction of specific equipment. All the projects are engineered and carried out in close cooperation with the customer and any third party suppliers. R&D evaluates the feasibility of an underwater repair, continue through design and construction of customized equipment and go all the way through to successful execution of the repair or replacement and subsequent follow-up.

BW Offshore has successfully used Miko magnetic patches in a pioneering new repair technique that creates significant time and cost savings. When some cracks appeared in hull plating in the engine room of the FPSO Abo operating off the Nigerian coast, the BW Offshore’s engineering project team chose magnetic patches from a Miko Tanker Kit to quickly seal the leak and make the vessel safe and secure. At that point conventional repair techniques would have required the vessel to either enter dry dock for repair or for a costly and time consuming exterior habitat to be built over the work location so the leak could be repaired permanently with the vessel in situ.

U.S. Navy’s AGOR Research Vessels are built to be as operationally quiet as possible. That’s where Mascoat’s Sound Control-dB coatings come in. When the U.S. Navy began its design and build program for its newest generation of research vessels, it specified that the vessels had to be as quiet as possible. That’s because a large part of ocean research involves listening and excessive ship noise tends to negate that effort. Achieving the goal of an exceptionally quiet vessel, the vessel’s design team employed a variety of methods to meet the Navy’s exacting standards, choosing systems, defined equipment locations and designed special installation methods with acoustics as a priority. One of those methods involved Mascoat’s Sound Control-dB coatings.

In July Hydrex mobilized a team of diver/technicians to Syros, Greece, for a complex repair operation on a 118-meter, 8550 DWT chemical tanker. The vessel had suffered large cracks in her hull plating as the result of a collision. She was not allowed to sail any further. Hydrex proposed a permanent on-site repair using an open top cofferdam. This would enable the fully laden ship to continue her journey. The tanker was berthed in Egypt when another vessel struck her portside hull. This caused a large hole, severe cracks and dented plating.

Great Lakes Group says it has reached the final stages of the routine maintenance and drydock contract on the USCG Cutter BISCAYNE BAY, the second of the USCG’s six Great Lakes-stationed 140-foot Bay-class ice-breaking tugs to be drydocked in the Group's shipyard. The mainenance project included: Hull Plating and Ultrasonic Testing Appendages and Leak Test Shaft Seal Assembly and Overhaul Rudder Assembly, Remove, Inspect and Reinstall Anchor Windlass, Level 2 Inspect and Repair Vertical Capstan, Level 2 Inspect and Repair Propulsion Shafting, Remove, Inspect, and Reinstall  Various Cleaning, Inspections, and Repairs

US Department of Defense inform it has awarded a $19,802,857 firm-fixed-price contract to Earl Industries, LLC, doing business as General Dynamics NASSCO Mayport, Jacksonville, Florida, for docking phased maintenance availability to include drydocking, hull plating replacement, propulsion engine removal and habitability work onboard 'USS Tornado' (PC 14). The docking phased maintenance availability work on USS Tornado consists of 55 percent hull structure repairs, 16 percent propulsion repairs, 11 percent paint/decking and preservation, and 8 percent auxiliary pumps and systems. The remaining 10 percent miscellaneous repairs consist of temporary services, electrical and electronic repairs. DoD adds that the basic work package consists of 89 work items.

Contracts have been awarded by the U.S. Department of Defense to Great Lakes Dredge & Dock, NASSCO-Mayport, Timken Gears & Services Inc., and Colonna's Shipyard, Inc. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., Oak Brook, Illinois, was awarded a $25,376,872 firm-fixed-price contract for dredging the main channel of the Delaware River. Work will be performed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with an estimated completion date of March 31, 2015. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is the contracting activity. Earl Industries L.L.C. doing business as NASSCO-Mayport, Jacksonville, Florida, is being awarded a not-to-exceed $23,238,392 undefinitized contract action for continuous maintenance availability to include structural damage and aluminum welding onboard USS Hue City (CG 66).

Great Lakes Shipyard hauled out the United States Coast Guard Cutter Biscayne Bay  using its 770-ton capacity Travelift. This is the second of the USCG’s six (6) Great Lakes stationed 140-foot Bay Class ice breaking tugs to be drydocked using Great Lakes Shipyard’s new Marine Travelift. The Shipyard’s Travelift has also been used to lift one of the 150-foot Buoy Barges pushed by the Bay Class Tugs, and the USCGC Buckthorn, stationed in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. The Travelift is the largest on the Great Lakes in the United States and Canada…

Among the latest Department of Defense, Navy, contracts, Ocean Ships Inc. of Houston is awarded a contract modification for operation & maintenance of 8 RoRo ships, and Colonna's Shipyard for drydocking and major refit of 'USS Shamal' (PC13). Ocean Ships, Inc., Houston, Texas, is being awarded a $32,383,461 modification under a previously awarded contract (N00033-09-C-3200) for the operation and maintenance of eight Watson-class large, medium-speed, roll-on/roll-off ships. This modification extends the contract for a period not to exceed six months, in accordance with FAR 52.217-8.

Simple annoyance or potential security threat? Spoof is defined as “a hoax or swindle.”  In the world of electronic networks, a spoofing attack is a situation in which one program successfully masquerades as another by falsifying data and thereby gaining an improper advantage. We have all heard of, and possibly fallen victim to, fraudulent card readers (often inserted on self-service fuel pumps). The fraudulent card readers copy security information from the credit card, which is then used to clone an illegitimate credit card and incur improper charges on the victim’s credit card account.