Pharos News

The Northern Lighthouse Board (NLB), the General Lighthouse Authority for Scotland and the Isle of Man announced the award of a £51.8 million contract to Spanish shipyard Astilleros Gondán S.A, for the build of a hybrid powered buoy tender vessel to support its vital safety service to mariners.The tender includes a commitment to place over £2 million of contracts with U.K. suppliers with a requirement for any contract over £25,000 to be advertised in the U.K. As part of the deal Gondán will also create a special fully funded internship program for up to 15 U.K.

The Department for Transport (DfT), in partnership with ABP’s Port of Southampton, launched UK’s first Port Economic Partnership (PEP).PEP is an innovative initiative to create stronger links between ports and Government, to maximize long-term trade and economic growth. The Partnership will be launched at an event at London International Shipping Week, on board the NLV Pharos lightship.As part of its strategy, ‘Maritime 2050 – Navigating the Future’, launched in January 2019, the Government outlined the creation of Port Economic Partnerships as one way of creating a strong business environment for ports to thrive, in turn, boosting trade…

Today many of us take aids to navigation for granted, and until they need to be replaced, we don’t realize how much we depend on them. Most marine navigation aids only require a routine inspection and maintenance after installation. Then they effectively continue their job so that mariners, harbor masters and other seafarers have one less thing to manage. However, it wasn’t always that way. The first marine aids to navigation were very different. Early mariners were guided into port by fires lit on hillsides to denote where the safe passage lay.

The challenges and opportunities posed by alternative fuels, safety management and social media dominated Interferry’s 42nd annual conference in Split, Croatia, where a record 370 delegates shared insights on ship technologies, safety issues including cyber security and the customer experience. Attendance at last week’s conference represented 210 ferry operators and suppliers from 27 countries. Mediterranean ferry operators voiced their concerns on meeting the 0.5 percent sulphur emissions cap due in 2020. Minoan Lines managing director Antonios Maniadakis complained that using low sulphur fuel would increase costs by €2 million per year.

Pharos Offshore announced Andy Warder has joined the team as Chief Operations Officer with immediate effect.   Warder joins Pharos with over 25 years’ experience in the offshore industry holding senior and executive management positions with a track record of successfully growing his business units and providing strong support and solutions to Clients predominantly throughout the Asia Pacific regions.

The wreck of the cargo ship Cemfjord, which sank in the Pentland Firth with eight men on board, has been located on the seabed. The wreck of the cargo ship Cemfjord, which sank in the Pentland Firth with eight men on board who are presumed dead, was yesterday found on the seabed. It was discovered in the eastern approaches to the Firth by the lighthouse tender, Pharos, using sonar equipment. The upturned hull of the Cypriot-registered Cemfjord - which was carrying cement - was spotted by a passing ferry on Saturday and sank the following day. No trace was found of its crew despite a huge search operation. The seven Polish nationals and one Filipino who were on board did not have time to send out a distress signal.

Stevens Institute of Technology has received a five-year, $6.6 million research grant from the Port Authority of New York/New Jersey (PANYNJ) to improve preparedness and resiliency at critical Port Authority infrastructure sites through an innovative observation and forecast system that provides information on the potential risk and magnitude of overland flooding prior to and during significant storm events. "We have envisioned a road map to more accurate flood forecasting by creating an ensemble of forecasts that, when brought together, should provide unprecedented levels of accuracy and uncertainty quantification," explained Stevens Professor Alan Blumberg, director of the University's Davidson Laboratory and principal investigator for the research .

Pharos Offshore Group has started construction of a newly designed remotely operated vehicle (ROV) specifically for the offshore wind farm cable market. The new Inter Turbine Array Trencher, the ITAT 800, is an 800 HP (600 kW) self-propelled trenching ROV that can be more easily maneuvered by the operators onboard its support ship than a towed plough. It uses a unique water jetting technology to cut the seabed. The technology is safer than a metal plough share or mechanical cutter around the valuable power cable.