GL Strengthens Inland Waterway Focus
Germanischer Lloyd has appointed a new Business Development Manager (BDM), Tom Dorsman, and a dedicated Technical Coordinator, Ruben Roeleveld, specialising in Inland Marine. Mr. Dorsman will provide a dedicated sales specialist for the inland waterway vessel (IWV) market. Mr Roeleveld will be responsible for coordinating activities between plan approval surveyors, field surveyors, business development managers and clients. Mr. Roeleveld will also be GL's contact with the IVW (Inspectie Verkeer en Waterstaat), the Dutch Shipping Inspectorate. Both
Dorsman and Roeleveld are based in Rotterdam.
Rotterdam is at the heart of the IWV trade and with big changes on the horizon, for example the phase out of single hull barges tanker barges in the Netherlands and Belgium, GL is positioning itself to help customers as new regulations and shifts in the market take place. Dorsman is looking forward to working with GL's clients in inland vessels. "Getting involved with special projects with the newest technology, for example diesel-electric hybrid drives and barges running on gas engines, is where I think that GL can really help our customers in the market over the next few years," he said.
Appointing a specialist BDM and Coordinator builds on GL's presence in the IWV market, and follows on from GL's authorisation by the EU in 2006 to conduct statutory inspections of inland vessels navigating in Community Inland Waterways. This year GL received full accreditation
from the IVW to conduct inspections on Dutch flagged inland vessels on their behalf. GL will also soon be issuing an updated version of their rules for inland navigation vessels.
Dorsman has been involved with Inland Vessels and components for most of his working life. After attending the KOPS (Koninklijk Onderwijsfonds voor de Scheepvaart/Royal School for Inland Waterway Vessels) in Rotterdam, Dorsman spent a short period at sea before returning to
work for Castrol. In 1992 he joined Detroit Diesel in Dordrecht Holland, and after that firm's acquisition by Daimler Chrysler, worked for MTU Friedrichshafen, responsible for sales on the Inland Marine Market. Dorsman worked for MTU until 2006 when he left to take up a position
with Kuipers Shipbuilding BV in Ridderkerk Holland. At Kuipers he worked as a broker and owners' superintendent for newbuild barges bringing cascos (IWV hulls), built in eastern Europe and later Asia, back for outfitting in the Netherlands.
Roeleveld most recently worked for the IVW as a ship inspector; conducting inspections of inland water vessels. He undertook field surveys and plan approval, as well as approving hull safety arrangements, fire insulation and other safety measures. Previous to this he was a ship plan approval surveyor at Lloyd's Register, mainly focused on hull construction in inland water vessels and yachts. He studied Design, Construction and Production at the faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Maritime Technique, University of Delft; graduating as a Master in Shipbuilding Engineering. Currently over 800 inland waterway vessels are GL classed, including modern double hulled tankers. Several seagoing vessels of GL's fleet are also subject to inland waterway certification.
