Mast News

HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding division has completed the dry dock portion of the refueling and complex overhaul (RCOH) of Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis (CVN 74).Following the recent flooding of more than 100 million gallons of water into the dry dock, USS John C. Stennis was moved to an outfitting berth at the shipyard, where the remainder of the RCOH work and testing will be completed.During the dry dock phase of the RCOH, USS John C. Stennis received significant upgrades and began an extensive overhaul process, both inside and outside the ship.

Louisiana-based boat builder Metal Shark has unveiled Prowler, its new autonomous, amphibious, and semi-submersible military craft engineered to meet the current and near future warfighting requirements of the U.S. military and its allies. The company is also debuting Frenzy, a high-performance, low-cost, amphibious micro-USV (uncrewed surface vehicle) with a payload carrying capacity of up to 14 pounds.“Prowler represents the sum total of everything we’ve learned while building 400-plus autonomous and remote operated vessels for our military customers over the past decade…

The Finnish Border Guard has held a keel laying ceremony for its new patrol vessel at Baltic Operator's shipyard in Gdansk.On March 12, 2024, a keel laying ceremony was arranged at Baltic Operator’s shipyard in Gdansk. The ceremony took place in the presence of the representatives of the Finnish Border Guard, Meyer Turku, Baltic Operator and Bureau Veritas.The keel laying ceremony is an old tradition. Before the keel laying, the ordering party - the Finnish Border Guard - and the shipyard’s representative placed their lucky coins under the keel beneath the first block.Later on…

Canada's Minister of Public Services and Procurement, Jean-Yves Duclos, on behalf of the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, Diane Lebouthillier, announced a contract award following a competitive process, valued at approximately $44 million (including taxes) to Ocean Industries Inc. for the vessel life extension of the CCGS Griffon.Scheduled to take place from June 2025 to October 2026, the vessel life extension work entails refurbishing and repairing the main propulsion motors…

Ukraine destroyed a Russian landing warship off the coast of occupied Crimea in an operation with naval drones that breached the vessel's port side on Wednesday and caused it to sink, Kyiv's military spy agency and armed forces said.There was no immediate comment from Russia, which said earlier that it had destroyed six drones in the Black Sea. The Kremlin declined to comment."The Ukrainian Armed Forces, together with the Defense Ministry's intelligence unit, destroyed the Tsezar Kunikov large landing ship.

Dutch company Huisman has secured a contract from Subsea 7 for the delivery of its 500MT offshore mast crane for one of pipelay vessels for deep water installations.The 500mt Offshore Mast Crane will be equipped with a passive and active heave compensation system on the main hoist to counter-act the vessel’s heave motion when landing a product onto the seabed.Huisman has upgraded its heave compensation system with a variety of new control modes to extend the operational window…

The International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) has developed a Unified Requirement (URH1) covering the release of ammonia from the onboard systems for bunkering, storing, preparing and using ammonia as fuel.IACS URH1 aligns with the Recommendations from U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and establishes that an ammonia concentration of 300 ppm or more is immediately dangerous, and a concentration of 25 ppm or more is dangerous if the exposure is longer than eight hours.Additionally…

Shipping companies remain in the dark over a new international navy coalition being assembled by the United States to combat attacks in the Red Sea, with many vessels continuing to avoid the area or cancelling contracts, sources said on Wednesday.The sources, who include shipping and maritime security officials, say few practical details are known about the initiative launched on Tuesday by Washington or whether it will directly engage in the event of further armed attacks at sea.Iran-backed Houthi militants in Yemen have since Nov.

A merchant ship sailing off Somalia has been hijacked by unknown raiders, Spain's defence ministry said on Tuesday, fuelling fears pirates are returning to the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea waters already plagued by a surge in attacks on shipping.A Spanish warship rushed to check on the Maltese-flagged vessel Ruen on Friday after reports it had been hijacked. It "has been under piracy (control) since the morning of Dec. 14," the ministry said in a statement, in its first confirmation of the ship's fate."The MV Ruen has indeed been hijacked.

The Philippines and China traded accusations on Sunday over a collision of their vessels near a disputed shoal in the South China Sea as tensions over claims in the vital waterway escalate.The Philippine coast guard accused China of firing water cannons and ramming resupply vessels and a coast guard ship, causing "serious engine damage" to one, while China's coast guard said the Philippine vessel intentionally rammed its ship.China claims almost the entire South China Sea, a conduit for more than $3 trillion of annual ship-borne commerce…

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration (MARAD) announced over $653 million to fund 41 port improvement projects across the nation under the Port Infrastructure Development Program (PIDP).The investments—part of the largest dedicated funding for ports and waterways in history, nearly $17 billion through the President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law—are intended to help grow capacity and increase efficiency at coastal seaports, Great Lakes ports and inland…

Offshore installation services firm Allseas has inaugurated 'Sandpiper', its new barge for shallow water offshore construction activities.Allseas said Thursday that the 170-meter barge was inaugurated this week in Singapore with a special ceremony after several upgrading activities in 2022/2023. The vessel is is a flat-bottom, anchored barge for shallow water offshore construction activities, purchased by Allseas in 2022 and upgraded for pipelaying in 2022/23.Sandpiper is equipped with a 10-point mooring system…

In the 45 years since the Arab Shipbuilding & Repair Yard (ASRY) opened on reclaimed land in Bahrain, the Middle East has become one of the world’s ship repair hotspots. A broad range of shipyards now service both regional and global markets.Regional yards have a ready market, with hundreds of offshore rigs working across the region together with the service ships that support them. Then there are thousands of tankers and gas carriers that arrive each year to load energy cargoes for far-flung destinations.

Ocean Craft Marine (OCM) based in Annapolis, Md., has delivered a new police boat to the St. James Parish, La. Sheriff’s Office Special Response Team (SRT).The St. James Parish Sherriff’s Office is adding the Ocean Craft Marine 8M Law Enforcement (LE) Interceptor rigid hull inflatable boat (RHIB) to its assortment of patrol craft in order to augment their riverine capabilities with the latest in high-performance hull designs. The Sheriff Office will utilize the new vessel to increase the effectiveness and timeliness of its response to domestic incidents…

MV Tennor Ocean, newbuilding 782, from Germany's shipyard Flensburger Schiffbau-Gesellschaft recently set off on test voyage on the North Sea and Baltic Sea. The 210-m RoRo ferry is on the move to Dock 3 at Lloyd Werft. During its week-long stay there, the shipbuilders of Flensburger Schiffbau-Gesellschaft (FSG) will carry out the remaining work on the ship’s hull to optimize the performance data. Afterwards, the “MV Tennor Ocean” will set out on a multi-day test voyage on the North Sea and the Baltic Sea.

Manama, Bahrain -- Advancing maritime domain awareness in the U.S. Naval Forces Central Command/U.S. Fifth Fleet area of responsibility (AOR) is a challenging task. Yet keeping the sea lanes open is critical for the region, for the U.S. and the world.U.S. Naval Forces Central Command (NAVCENT), U.S. Fifth Fleet and Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) are all headquartered here in Bahrain, under the command of Vice Admiral Brad Cooper. U.S. Fifth Fleet oversees the operations for all U.S. naval forces in the Middle East.

Under a contract with the Norwegian Defense Materiel Agency, the sensor solutions provider Hensoldt will equip submarines of the Norwegian "Ula" class with new periscopes and optronic mast systems. The contract value is more than EUR 40 million.

Shipboard fire a constant threat: Bonhomme Richard tragedy an enduring lesson in fire prevention, responseJuly 12, 2020 was a lazy Sunday morning at Naval Base San Diego. USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6), which had been commissioned only two years earlier, had recently made the base its new homeport and was docked as it underwent a maintenance availability.But, the silence of that morning was rocked by an explosion a few minutes before 9 a.m., changing everything for the Wasp-class amphibious assault ship.Below the decks…

I was discussing torsional stiffness in ship’s hulls with one of our intern engineers and pointed out a torsional stiffness problem with a certain hull design section since it could not inscribe a decent sized circle.I expected it to be a comment that would be confusing to a young engineer and proceeded to explain that torsional stiffness is related to gyradius which is powerfully related to radius and radius is related to circles. Inherently the stiffest shape in torsion is a…

A 112-year-old tall ship has toppled over during a drydock maintenance period in South Africa.The Netherlands-registered Europa fell over during an attempt to transfer the steel-hulled barque back into the water from drydock at a Cape Town ship repair facility, leaving one crewmember with minor injuries."The injured sailor is receiving the necessary medical care and is doing well, given the circumstances," the ship's operator Bark Europa said. "He is currently in stable condition…

The U.S. Navy on Wednesday sent an uncrewed surface vessel (USV) through the Strait of Hormuz as it ramps up its use of high-tech unmanned assets for patrols and monitoring at sea.The transit was reportedly the Navy's fist for a USV through the busy and strategically important strait, demonstrating the continued operational integration of unmanned and artificial intelligence systems by U.S. maritime forces in the Middle East.The L3 Harris Arabian Fox MAST-13 USV was accompanied by a pair of Sentinel-class Coast Guard cutters…

Carnival's Seabourn brand has taken delivery of its second purpose-built, ultra-luxury expedition ship, Seabourn Pursuit, during an official handover ceremony at the T. Mariotti shipyard in Genoa, Italy. The "yacht like" small ship is designed and built for remote, diverse environments to PC6 Polar Class standards and includes modern hardware and technology that extend the ship's global deployment and capabilities and allows the line to offer a wide range of expedition activities led by an expert 24-person expedition team of scientists…

Iceland has suspended the operations of one of its two whaling vessels for taking too long to kill a fin whale, the authorities and the boat's owner said on Friday.The government two weeks ago ended a two-month pause in whaling that had been imposed after a report concluded that killing whales took longer than Iceland's animal welfare law allowed.Although it imposed stricter regulations and surveillance in order to limit the whales' suffering, there were nevertheless protests from animal welfare campaigners and Hollywood stars including Leonardo DiCaprio.An inspection carried out on Sept.