Shipgaz No 1/10 by Henrik Bergqvist

Price EUR 12 No 1 – February 12, 2010 www.shipgaz.com

The daily details of a

site team The world’s two largest ropax-vessels are under construction in Germany. The white book with the contract specification is never far from the hands of the Swedish site team. PAGE 42

Too fat to be safe? While the average seafarer’s belly grows at a steady pace, so does the concern over what is becoming an increasingly troublesome safety issue. PAGE 28

Apple close to the tree Being a shipowner’s daughter, Laura LanghLagerlöf never had a doubt on what to become. PAGE 18

ny!

rma

l ser

oca w! L

PRESENTS

ble a

aila e av

vic

n Ge lso i

JOB WELL DONE IN BILGE CLEANING

WE DO NOT MOVE THE DIRT,

WE REMOVE IT!

Hans Langh Cleaning Services has acquired its legendary reputation with its speedy action and excellent quality in bilge cleaning. We do not merely move the dirt from one place to another, but we really remove it. With our electrical equipment, we create the power of a real-life vacuum truck in the engine room. In this way, we are able to remove the heavy oil also from below pipes and machinery. Our efficient, yet mobile special equipment enables us to clean ship’s heavy oil tanks also during voyage if necessary. Learn of our skill demonstrations on our website and also enter a competition. You might win a 52“ TV or a Breitling Colt watch.

• CLEANING of tanks, bilges, engine rooms, decks and cargo • WATERJETTING up to 3000 bar holds and HFO contamination • PREVENTING further damage • after engine room ﬁre or ﬂood ed engine room •

HANS LANGH AND SHIP CLEANING SERVICES PROUDLY PRESENTS SERVICE CENTER AT BLOHM & VOSS. STARRING PROFESSIONALS WITH 35 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE. ALSO STARRING MOBILE UNITS. LOCATION NORTHERN GERMANY SUPPLY COMPREHENSIVE SERVICE PALLET OFTEN WITH TURNKEY BASIS. PHONE +358 2 477 9400 E-MAIL CLEANING@LANGH.FI ISO 9001

BUREAU VERITAS Certification

ISO 9001

ISO 14001

BUREAU VERITAS

Certification

ISO 14001

BUREAU VERITAS Certification

Certification

www.hanslangh.fi

FOR DIESEL ENGINE MAINTENANCE

Adress: P O Box 370, SE-401 25 Göteborg, Sweden Phone: +46-31-62 95 70 Fax: +46-31-80 27 50 E-mail: info@shipgaz.com Internet: www.shipgaz.com ISSN 2000-169X Editor-in-Chief/Publisher Rolf P Nilsson +46-31-62 95 80, rolf@shipgaz.com

Marketing Director Lars Adrians +46-31-62 95 71 , lars@shipgaz.com

THE BEST INVESTMENT FOR YOUR VESSEL - PUTS YOUR DIESEL AHEAD WE ALSO CARRY OUT THE WORK, IN-SITU OR IN OUR WORKSHOPS

Assistant Editor-in-Chief Anna Lundberg +46-31-62 95 83, anna.lundberg@shipgaz.com

WORLDWIDE SALES AND SERVICE NETWORK

Sales Manager Tomas Lindberg +46-31-62 95 84, tomas@shipgaz.com SALES REPRESENTATIVE, GERMANY:

Tobias Herrmann, Lübeck +49-4541-86 02 21 tobias.herrmann@shipgaz.com EDITORIAL STAFF:

Pierre Adolfsson, Göteborg, Sweden pierre@shipgaz.com

For 2-stroke & 4-stroke engines Valve seat grinding/machining Valve spindle grinding Cylinder liner honing Sealing surfaces grinding/machining Portable lathes for various purposes Special machines for workshops

Bent Mikkelsen Ringkøbing, Denmark bent@shipgaz.com Pär-Henrik Sjöström Turku, Finland par-henrik@shipgaz.com ART DIRECTOR:

Olle Paulsson, olle@shipgaz.com

Dag Bakka Bergen, Norway dag@shipgaz.com

PRINTED AT:

Fredrik Davidsson, Göteborg, Sweden fredrik@shipgaz.com

For further contact details, please visit www.shipgaz.com

AB Danagårds Grafiska, www.danagards.se

Magnus Hägg, Göteborg, Sweden magnus@shipgaz.com FRONT PAGE PICTURE

Grimaldi Lines is the leading ro-ro multipurpose carrier in its trading areas. Grimaldi Lines provides regular services between North Europe, the Mediterranean, West Africa, the East Coast of South America and Intramediterranean. The new generation of ro-ro multipurpose vessels of the Grimaldi Group is highly technological and provides for reliable and high quality services. Read more on page 35 and on www.grimaldi.co.uk THE OPTIMUM SOLUTION

A subscription to Shipgaz gives you six issues per year and a weekly newsletter by e-mail for only EUR 80 per year (plus shipping). For further subscription details, visit www.shipgaz.com/subscribe or Phone: +46 770 457 114 E-mail: kundtjanst@titeldata.se Web: www.prenservice.se NEXT ISSUE

No 2 is published on April 16.

Price EUR 12 No 1 – February 12, 2010 www.shipgaz.com

CHRIS-MARINE HEAD OFFICE AND SUBSIDIARIES:

It’s all About the

White Book The world’s two largest ropax-vessels are under construction in Germany. The white book with the contract specification is never far from the hands of the Swedish site team. PAGE 42

Too fat to be safe? While the average seafarer’s

belly grows at a steady pace, so does the concern over what is becoming an increasingly troublesome safety issue. PAGE 28

Apple close to the tree Being a shipowner’s daughter, Laura Langh-

Lagerlöf never had a doubt on what to become. PAGE 18

Chris-Marine AB•Tel: +46 - 40 671 2600•info@chris-marine.com IOP Marine A/S•Tel: +45 - 4498 3833•contact@iopmarine.dk Chris-Marine (S) Pte. Ltd.•Tel: +65 - 6268 8611•chrism@chris-marine.com.sg CM Hellas Ltd.•Tel: +30 - 210 4826 060•info.gr@chris-marine.com Chris-Marine Rep Office Shanghai•Tel: +86 - 21 65759331•info.cn@chris-marine.com Chris-Marine Rep Office St. Petersburg•Tel: +7 - 911 908 5482•info.ru@chris-marine.com Chris-Marine Rep Office India•Tel: +91 - 712 224 2719•info.in@chris-marine.com

SWEDEN DENMARK SINGAPORE GREECE P.R.of CHINA RUSSIA INDIA

4 SHIPGAZ NO 1 2010

Intro FEATURE

New challenges WELCOME A thought that occurs to most people with some years of experience in their field is: “Is this really what I’m going to spend my life doing?” The job may be rewarding and even well-paid, but then there is the need for new challenges, to move on and evolve.

A group of people that got the opportunity to try their skills in a new and challenging circumstance is the site team present at the construction of two ropaxes ordered by Stena RoRo. We followed them as they went on their numerous inspections, making sure that every syllable in the contract specification is complied with. Jacob StoltNielsen, born in 1931, stepped down as chairman just as his company, Stolt-Nielsen SA, turned 50. Our reporter describes him as “the innovator, ambitious and occasionally arrogant, impulsive and impatient, unconventional yet firm on dress code, but above all with entrepreneurial zest for new business and new concepts.”

»COP15 was a disppointment to many and certainly not enlightening when it comes to shipping«

The climate change conference in Copenhagen, COP15, was a disppointment to many and certainly not enlightening when it comes to shipping. The three-page Accord signed by the world leaders did not mention shipping at all. But we got a look at the low-emission ship Viking Lady, on display at the summit. Read also about the growing concern for the broadening waistline of seafarers. You are most welcome to another year with Shipgaz.

ASSISTANT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Anna Lundberg anna.lundberg@shipgaz.com

NEWCOMER The Dan Swift has gone from being a ro-ro to a cable layer and now, after an extensive rebuild, to an accommodation and support vessel. PAGE 22

PORTRAIT Laura Langh-Lagerlöf always preferred the shipping business among the many activities of the Langh family’s spectrum of companies. PAGE 18

SPOTLIGHT TECHNOLOGY Extensive weld repair in way of the engine room may create more headache for the superintendent than the grounding damage itself. PAGE 80

NO 1 2010 SHIPGAZ 5

Intro

»The possibility for a seafarer to ‘make an honest mistake’ is narrowing significantly in the eyes of authorities« EDITORIAL PAGE 7

In this issue 18 “There is no easy money in shipping” 22 An unusual rebuild in place 28 Obesity – a safety issue at sea 36 No news for shipping from COP15 38 Lady on display at COP15 40 New rules concern all vessels 42 The daily details of a site team 74 Next stop Abidjan 76 Bridge team without teamwork 78 All Baltic Sea ports in one book It may look like confusion, but inspector Anders Efraimsson is the calm centre of it all. His role in the site team is responsibility for the electrical installations on the two biggest ropaxes in the world, under construction for Stena RoRo at Nordic Yards in Germany. PAGE 42

80 Weld repair or welding damage 90 Jacob Stolt-Nielsen: 50 years of entrepreneurship 98 Levant trader taken by Soviet

Regular sections 7

Editorial

8 Review 16 Market Review 18 Portrait 22 Newcomer When Jacob Stolt-Nielsen stepped down as chairman of Stolt-Nielsen SA on December 15, 2009, it was exactly on the company’s 50th anniversary. PAGE 90 RETRO

SPOTLIGHT SAFETY The Maria M grounding

is an illustration of faulty bridge team work. How can something like this happen to an experienced master? PAGE 76

86 Fleet Review 82 Technical Review 90 Retro

Flexibility FALKVARV – SERVICE SPECIALISTS FOR ALL TYPES OF TONNAGE

Two floating docks with following dimensions Dock 1 Max. ship length 120 m Max. ship width 19 m Lifting capacity 4,500 tons

REPAIR QUAY

Length Depth Crane capacity

Dock 2 155 m 25 m 7,500 tons

250 m 7m 36 tons

Falkvarv AB, situated on the Swedish west coast between the strait of Öresund and Gothenburg, is a shipyard characterised by high technical expertise and solid long-term experience.

• Rebuildings • Class works • Chocking of main engines • CAP-measuring

A well-developed network of highly skilled sub-contractors and collaboration partners enables us to offer a high level of capacity at short notice.

Falkvarv AB, Hamnvägen 12, S-311 32 Falkenberg, Sweden Telephone +46 (0)346 - 141 50 • Telefax +46 (0)346 - 819 85

E-mail info@falkvarv.se www.falkvarv.se

NO 1 2010 SHIPGAZ 7

Editor-In-Chief Rolf P Nilsson rolf@shipgaz.com

Editorial

An indispensable species »Among active and prospective seafarers it is a signal that the possibility for a seafarer to ‘make an honest mistake’ is narrowing significantly in the eyes of authorities«

he International Maritime Organisation has declared 2010 the year of the seafarer, to pay tribute to the around 1.5 million people manning the ships that carry world trade and to recognise their unique contribution to the world. It is also a way to show that the shipping community stands behind them in their professional life and that the international regulatory regime understands the pressures and efforts of seafaring. In a Christmas greeting to the seafarers of the world, the IMO secretary-general Efthimios E Mitropoulos said that ”we do so with deep appreciation, in recognition of the extraordinary service you render every day of your professional life, frequently under dangerous circumstances, in delivering, to the more than 6.5 billion people of the world, the wheat that makes our daily bread, the gas and oil that warms our homes or moves our vehicles and the gifts we will share and enjoy with our families and friends over this Festive Season.”

To acknowledge the world’s seafarers, their efforts and their contributions are of course most welcomed in a time when the people manning the world merchant fleet to such a degree is met by disrespect, ignorance and distrust by authorities and also have to face serious crime in ports around the world and at sea. To date, Somali pirates, often at gunpoint for months, have held more than 1,500 seafarers hostages. Last year, ITF counted at least 370 seafarers that were abandoned on vessels, when owners took their hands from the vessels in port and left the people on board without pay, stores and at the mercy of local authorities, charity organisations and helpful citizens and store owners. Prestige, Hebei Spirit and Full City are cases where officers have been jailed or been prohibited to go home for months, with charges that could lead to many years in prison hanging over them. Another related case is the treatment of the master of Finneagle, where the master was thrown into a jail cell after having, in accordance with the regulations, reported an accidental spill of bunker oil. In those cases it is more or less obvious that society is looking for scapegoats to blame for environmental accidents. In most of those cases, the officers have faced what is probably the worst nightmare they have ever experienced in their professional lives, having to take immediate decisions under severe stress to save their ships. In retrospect, investigators might have found wrong decisions or an element of negligence

prior to the accident, but there are no indications whatsoever of any criminal intent or even gross negligence from the officers’ side, and this should have been clear already at an early stage of the investigations.

In the Coral Sea case, three seafarers were jailed for more than a year for drugs found in two of 27,000 banana boxes in the ship’s holds, although it was immediately clear that the three had nothing to do with the smuggling. In Venezuela, four officers from two vessels have been waiting for years to be tried for drugs found clamped to the hulls of the ships. Add to this the treatment of all seafarers as potential terrorists after the September 11 attack. Improvements have been made, but seafarers still face visa troubles and are denied shore leaves. Seafarers will of course welcome the IMO appreciation of their work, but most of the trouble described above comes from authorities that do not fall under the realm of IMO. Armed forces and government ministries and agencies other than those dealing with maritime issues must handle the long-lasting solution of the piracy issue. A huge chunk of the responsibility for those seafarers that are left abandoned by irresponsible shipowners lies of course with cargo owners supporting substandard shipping by hiring the cheapest ship they can find without having any quality or conscious concerns for their choice.

Responsibility for criminalisation and bad treatment of seafarers lie with politicians and legal systems that often have little or no knowledge of the reality of seafaring and maritime transport. Cases like the Hebei Spirit are of course rare, and few seafarers will encounter anything similar during their professional lives, but among active and prospective seafarers it is a signal that the possibility for a seafarer to “make an honest mistake” is narrowing significantly in the eyes of authorities, and that you might have to pay for a mistake with a number of years behind bars. The challenge for IMO will be to enlighten the rest of the world, to make the global community understand that a seafarer is precious species, indispensable for world trade and development, and should be treated accordingly.

Rolf P Nilsson, Editor-in-Chief

8 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Review Photo: Martin Mydtskov Rønne

Photo: u.s. Coast guard

Photo: Vladimir Orlov

Photo: dfds

Norfolk Line charters DFDS’ Tor Britannia.

Norfolk Line sells ro-ro ships Norfolk Line has sold two ro-ro vessels to the Tunisian ferry operator Cotunav. The first of the pair has been delivered and changed names from Maersk Vlaardingen to Amilcar, flying the Tunisian flag. The sister vessel Maersk Voyager will follow in March this year.

The Russian Arktika-classed nuclearpowered icebreaker 50 Let Pobedy.

business

The ro-ros were purchased on the secondhand market by Norfolk Line in 2005 from the Turkish UND Ro/Ro and operated between Istanbul and Trieste. Flensburger Schiffsbau Gesellschaft built the ro-ro sisters in 2000. The sale comes almost at the same time as the sale of Norfolk Line to DFDS Group came through. At the same time Norfolk Line has chartered the DFDS ro-ro Tor Britannia as replacement for the sold Flensburg ro-ro on the Norfolk Line service from Vlaardingen to Felixstowe. The 14,200 DWT-vessels Maersk Vlaardingen and Maersk Voyage have 2,640 lanemeters on the decks. The price tag is EUR 32 million for each vessel, according to media reports.

Nuclear propulsion brewing at Lloyd’s propulsion Nuclear propulsion is a controversial subject, indeed. However, as the public awareness of the implication of greenhouse gases grows – nuclear propulsion might meet increased acceptance among the society. And the steady increase in the price of fuel oil and the probable introduction of either a carbon-emissions trading scheme or a related tax have also raised the subject of other propulsion systems.

Today, two nuclear icebreakers are utilised on popular passenger cruises. Early in 2007, Lloyd’s Register began research into the implications of nuclear propulsion for merchant ships. ”The technology is there to commence

building nuclear ships. The issues regarding their acceptability and the need for a cultural step-change in shipping still need to be addressed so that society is comfortable any risk is being managed”, says John Carlton, Global Head, Marine Technology & Investigations, Lloyd’s Register. Most nuclear-powered ships and submarines to date have relied on pressurised water reactor (PWR) technology and they have demonstrated an enviable record for reliability and safety when operated correctly. However, other nuclear technologies soon may be available, including a range of hightemperature reactors, the pebble-bed concept, and designs developing on the original PWR concept, according to Lloyd’s Register.

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 9

Review Photo: DFDS

Photo: gr33ndata/Flickr.com

Photo review

1. haiti One week after the devastating earthquake, the largest port in the Haiti capital Port-au-Prince was reopened. 2. End of story The ever-hassling Samsø ferry Kanhave will be replaced, says the chairman of the board of Nordic Ferry Service, Per Gullestrup. 3. No fee raise For the second year in a row, the Suez Canal authorities have decided not to increase transit tolls. 4. old new route St Peter Line is planning to re-open the ferry route between Helsinki and St Petersburg with the Princess Maria (ex Queen of Scandinavia).

Photo: pär-henrik sjöström

Photo: bent mikkelsen

The Port of Kotka.

Trondur I Gøtu, the next vessel to be delivered from Skagen.

Karstensens to build multi-task vessel order Karstensens Skibsværft has signed a contract with Norwegian Sævik & Ervik A/S, Fosnavåg, to build a super fishing vessel measuring 80.4 metres in length. The vessel will have equipment for offshore work.

The vessel will be delivered in April 2011 and replace the owner’s present vessel Kings Cross. Karstensens Skibsværft has agreed with the A P Møller-Mærsk owned Baltija Shipyard to build the hull, which

will be towed to Skagen for outfitting. The new vessel will be a dual purpose vessel as it will be able to handle ROV units for inspections of pipelines. Furthermore, the vessel will be equipped with a special retractable keel with electronic equipment for scientific research of the oceans. The vessel will be named Christina E and follows the Faroese Trøndur I Götu, which will be delivered next month as the most expensive newbuilding from the shipyard.

“The vessels will burn around ten per cent less fuel than a comparable suezmax vessel” Ulf G Ryder, CEO of Swedish Stena Bulk after ordering two 158,000 DWT tankers from South Korea’s Samsung to be delivered in 2011.

Hamina and Kotka to merge? business The Centre for Maritime Studies has investigated the possibilities to increase the cooperation between the ports of Hamina and Kotka. In its study the expert group recommends a merger between the ports. The workgroup that has ordered the report has not yet taken a stand on this matter, but has decided to proceed as planned with stage two. This includes a closer study of the economical consequences of the different alternatives.

12,1

Wärtsilä’s net sales grew 14 per cent to EUR 5.3 billion and the profitability is reported to be at a record level, 12.1 per cent of net sales. In 2009, the order intake fell 41 per cent. The order book totalled EUR 4.5 billion at the end of the year.

10 Shipgaz no 1 2010

Review Photo: sergeant johan lundahl/ swedish arMed forCes

2008 293 attacks

The graph shows an increase in piracy attacks over the past four years.

Over 400 piracy attacks last year piracy A total of 406 incidents of piracy and armed robbery were reported in 2009, the International Maritime Bureau’s Piracy Reporting Centre in Kuala Lumpur confirms. In 2008, 293 attacks were reported. The last time piracy figures exceeded 400 incidents was in 2003.

”however, deMand for ships could grow faster than expected due to two factors: the accelerated application of extra slow steaming and a stronger recovery on the Far East-Europe trade.” Deliveries of new container carriers are expected to reach 1.54 MTEU this year, 43 per cent higher than the total deliveries in 2009. The fleet growth in 2010 is expected to be 9.9 per cent, taking into account a scrapping level of 250,000 TEUs.

in 2009, 153 vessels were boarded, 49 vessels were hijacked, there were 84 attempted attacks and 120 vessels were fired upon. A total of 1,052 crew members were taken hostage. 68 crew members were injured in the various incidents and eight were killed. Somalia is still the “worst” country on the list. Photo: tony des landes/shiPsPotting

Lauritzen Bulkers A/S, a subsidiary of J. Lauritzen in Copenhagen, has taken delivery of the Signe Bulker, which is the ﬁrst unit in a series from Jiangmen Nanyang Ship Engineering Co at Jiangmen, China. The newbuilding, 32,500 DWT has a length of 179.9 metres and beam of 28.4 metres.

2007 263 attacks

2006 239 attacks

business The current overcapacity in the container shipping market is forecast to remain until 2013, based on the latest Alphaliner fleet projections. “The idle containership fleet, which presently stands at 1.44 MTEU, is expected to remain at current levels for two more years before it will start to decline in 2012, based on a moderate growth in containerized trade of 5 per cent during 2010, increasing to 7.5 per cent in 2011 and ten per cent thereafter”, writes Alphaliner in its latest report and continues:

2009 406 attacks

Photo: fredrik davidsson

Container ﬂeet overcapacity until 2013

The ToTal nuMber of incidents attributed to the Somali pirates stands at 217 with 47 vessels hijacked and 867 crew members taken hostage. 2009 has, however, seen a significant shift in the area of attacks off Somalia. While the attacks in 2008 predomi-

nantly focused on the Gulf of Aden, 2009 witnessed more vessels also being targeted along the east coast of Somalia and the Indian Ocean. 28 incidenTs were reporTed for Nigeria in 2009. Of these, 21 vessels were boarded, three vessels were fired upon, one vessel was hijacked and three masters reported an attempted attack on their vessel. The majority of the incidents off Nigeria were related to the oil industry. “The Nigerian attacks are however much more violent in nature than Somalia, localised but with the capacity to attack vessels and installations further from the coast, says the IMB Director Pottengal Mukundan.

”Celebrity let bigotry – not parity – drive its new policy” Bill Donohue, president of Catholic civil rights organisation Catholic League, comments on Celebrity Cruises having decided to no longer have Catholic priests on board to conduct daily mass. To explain the change of policy the cruise giant refers to “a great deal of negative feedback” from passengers related to Catholic services.

Join with Success

www.ttsgroup.com

TTS Marine RoRo equipment · Side loading systems · Hatch covers · Marine cranes Equipment for cruise vessels and megayachts · Deck machinery · Global service network

12 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Review Photo: transatlantic

Photo: waterweg

The MR product carrier Nord Stream in the Norden fleet of product carriers.

Product tanker trio to Norden business Dampskibsselskabet Norden has taken advantage of the weak market for product tankers and purchased three modern units from a Turkish owner for USD 79 million.

The three MR (Medium Range) type, 51,213 DWT tankers were delivered from STX Shipbuilding in South Korea in 2007 and 2008. The vessels are the Gan-Sabre, Gan-Shield and Gan-Spirit, and they will change names to Nord Sound, Nord Sea and Nord Strait respectively after the takeover in March/April this year. After the purchase, the Norden tanker fleet consists of 31 units, of which twelve are owned by Norden. Another seven vessels are on order for delivery in the next few years. The three new units will fly the Singapore flag after the takeover and will be commercially operated by Norient Product Pool, which is 50/50 owned by Norden and Interorient Navigation Company Ltd. The pool operates 63 product tankers.

Vote now shipgaz poll Norway tries to get more Norwegian shipowners to choose the Norwegian flag. Does Norway offer a good shipping environment?

51% Yes. 27% No. 22% I don’t know. Please visit our website at www.shipgaz.com, and take part in our web polls.

Transatlantic’s offshore vessel Vidar Viking, delivered by Havyard Leirvik AS, Norway, in 2001.

Transatlantic in for four new icebreakers business The Skärhamn-based shipping company Transatlantic may place a major order before the end of the year – four large icebreakers at a total cost of SEK 4 billion. “We anticipate a decision before the end of next summer, with delivery set for about 2013. We are looking at icebreakers of about the same size as the Oden and with the same capacity. I can confirm that the price per unit is in the region of SEK 1 billion. But I don’t know whether they will have dieselelectric propulsion like the Oden. That remains to be seen”, says Stefan Eliasson, acting MD.

”There is a strategy for offshore and icebreaking activities when it comes to existing vessels, but we realise that very much will be happening in the offshore field in the next few years in the US and Canada and in the Arctic areas. In order to develop the concept, we thus want to order powerful icebreakers that can operate in tough environments. In the Arctic, we have ice conditions with three-metre thick multiyear ice.” The Oden, which is owned by the Swedish Maritime Administration, has a length of 107.7 metres and a beam of 31.2 metres. The vessel’s main engine develops 24,500 hp, giving her a speed of 15 knots. Transatlantic is currently working intensively to secure long charter contracts with one or more of the major oil companies, among them Exxon.

”We definitely need contracts with oil companies, you don’t build these vessels on speculation. I can’t comment on how these discussions are going, but Exxon is one of the interested parties.” Parallel with this, Transatlantic is negotiating with several shipyards, including Croatian Uljanik Shipyard. Since Saab AB is in negotiations involving the sale of several Gripen fighter aircraft to the Croatian air force, Uljanik is highly interesting. The Croatian government is demanding an industrial offset deal with Sweden. This has been confirmed by Jerry Sigfeldt, international negotiator for Saab AB, in an interview with the Swedish newspaper Bohusläningen. And this is where Transatlantic comes into the picture. ”Saab AB has sniffed out that we are looking for shipyards and has approached us. We have no opinion about this, it seems to be standard procedure for this type of deal”, says Stefan Eliasson, and continues: ”I understand that Uljanik Shipyard could get help from Saab in order to be able to offer us good terms, more than that I don’t know. But we are not in discussions with Saab; instead, we will hold the formal dialogue with the shipyard and will assess their offer in the same way as we look at other offers. I want to emphasise that we are having discussions with several shipyards.”

no 1 2010 Shipgaz 13

Review Photo: bent Mikkelsen

Photo:u.s. Coast guard

The newbuilding was to replace the old NordsĂ¸en.

Danmark pulls out of deal business The Danish Department of Fisheries has finally decided to cancel the almost finished newbuilding from the Spanish shipyard Astilleros Construcciones S.A. at Vigo.

On January 23, the tug Dixie Vengeance, with the two barges it was pushing, collided with the tanker Eagle Otome on the east bank of the Sabine Neches Waterway, Port Arthur, Texas. Approximately 420,000 gallons of crude oil leaked out into the water.

The 68.1 MeTres long combined rescue and control vessel has been under construction since 2007, but in the beginning of 2009 the shipyard filed for economical protection in order to make a reconstruction. Despite several months of negotiations in order to urge the shipyard to finish the vessel, the project will not be finalized.

Shipgaz Jobs. Your recruitment service. The online recruitment service, browse the available positions in shipping or let Shipgaz help you find the right personnel. With outstanding reach in Scandinavia, Finland, Germany and Poland shipgaz jobs reaches more than 10000 shipping professionals both onboard and shore based. A service from Shipgaz.

www.shipgaz.com/jobs

14 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Review Photo: pär-henrik sjöström

Photo: bergen group

Bergen secures jobs at Fosen labour By moving the outfitting of a hull from its yard in Bergen to its facility in Fosen, the Bergen group has secured jobs at the Fosen yard, where a large part of the workforce has been given notice during the winter. However, with the new project, employment has been secured until the end of the third quarter. “We have been able to do this because we are in a period with record high activity in our group’s shipbuilding division, mainly at our yard in Bergen. The move is in itself a major task, but we have found constructive solutions together with the shipowner and sub-contractors that will leave both margins and delivery times unchanged”, says CEO Pål Engebretsen. The hull was launched on Friday, January 22, at the shipyard Stocznia Gdansk and is expected to arrive in Fosen at the beginning of March.

The Allure of the Seas in the building dock last summer.

Finland to save its bleeding yard industry

Photo: loksa shipyard

Loksa Shipyard sacks personnel labour Estonian Loksa Shipyard is laying off all its production personnel of 525 persons due to order drought. The company will keep two members of its management board and staff on parental leave in the hope to win new orders and re-hire the former employees, says personnel manager Marju Varter to Tradewinds.

labour There is a deep concern about the future for the Finnish shipbuilding industry. The market for new orders is virtually dead and it has been stated that there are no new orders in sight in a reasonable future. This will have a serious effect, especially on the flagship of Finnish shipbuilding, STX Finland’s Turku Shipyard. As a builder of large cruise vessels the Turku Shipyard and its production methods are certainly of top class in the world. However, today there is only one ship under construction, the Allure of the Seas, which will be delivered in autumn 2010.

The Helsinki Shipyard has no newbuildings on order since the delivery of the ferry Armorique a year ago. At the Rauma Shipyard the situation is better with two large ferries for P&O and a polar supply and research vessel for the South African Department of Environmental Affairs in order. Some weeks ago STX Finland announced that lay-offs and permanent cuts of the workforce will take place at the Turku shipyard. The yard’s activities will be adjusted to the current market situation, which means that about 370 blue-collar workers and 60 white-collar workers will be given notice. Lay-offs will gradually increase and practically all the employees will be given notice after the delivery of the Allure of the

Seas if no new orders have been received by that time. Also the government seems to understand the serious situation. Powerful measurements have been proposed by a workgroup established by the Ministry of Employment and the Economy to help the shipbuilding industry and its suppliers through the most difficult time. The proposed measures include utilizing all the possibilities of support that EU agrees to and which are used in other leading shipbuilding nations within EU. One of these would be a tax lease system of a similar model as in Spain and France. This means that a finance institute buys the newbuilding and enters a long term leasing agreement with the shipping company operating the vessel. In media it has been flashed that Viking Line would be a potential saver of the Turku shipyard, if ordering two ferries for the Turku–Åland–Stockholm service. It has been confirmed that Viking Line has invited tenders for new ferries from a number of shipyards. It goes without saying that if Viking Line decides that now is the right time to order, the listed company cannot by any means be forced to place an order in Finland. But if the conditions are favourable and the price is competitive, the option would no doubt be seriously taken into consideration by the management.

Photo: Knut Revne

Ship operations in cold climate It’s about partnership. DNV (Det Norske Veritas) has over the years gained unique experience related to design and ship operations in cold climate. The current DNV classed ﬂeet of vessels built for operation in cold climate consists of around 1700 vessels of all types. For oil tankers with ice class, DNV has a major part of the vessels in operation. In addition to the basic ice classes covering requirements to hull and propulsion DNV’s WINTERIZED notations are specifying standards for vessels operating in cold climate. DNV is also offering services beyond basic classiﬁcation, like risk assessment and ice load monitoring of structures.

DNV serving the Maritime Industry www.dnv.com

16 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Market Review

A year of many downs and some ups Analysis 2009 became a challenging year for shipping, but it also had its positive moments, at least compared to the forecasts from the most strenuous doomsday watchers. It was a unique year for liner shipping, hitting shipowners and operators with something they had never encountered before. In a sector with steady growth since the container was introduced, the people working in liner trade had to find ways to tackle a decline of volumes close to 10 per cent. As if this wasn’t bad enough, mega large vessels were ordered in times when prospects for finance were obvious, carriers were confident

»Mega large vessels were ordered in times when prospects for finance were obvious« that demand was to ever increase and newbuildings came rolling in with avalanche speed. Slow steaming, even super-slow steaming, become one of the answers, lay-up, whether cold or warm, another. Delays and

cancellation of orders have been, and are, common issues for negotiations between owners and shipyards. Add to this an increasing scrapping activity. All the same, capacity is expected to rise by 8–10 per cent this year, with brokers expecting the fleet to increase by some 40 per cent over the coming years. This, and a need for volumes to rise by over 10 per cent to reach the levels from 2008, show that it will take time before liner shipping becomes a success saga again. The large tanker sectors have also experienced the same lows, but also some ups.

Brigther prospects for the offshore market in 2010 offshore Despite a low rate level, December and January have seen a quite dynamic market with a steady flow of requirements. Some vessels have left the North Sea for jobs elsewhere and some of the laid-up ships have been reactivated. The prospects for 2010 appear somewhat brighter than most of us figured out six months ago. But with 54 platform vessels and 46 anchor-handlers of North Sea standards due for delivery, according to Hagland Offshore, it will certainly be a challenging year.

Straight cargo runs were fixed below GBP 3,000, but larger units fetched between 8,000 and 9,000. Ending a quiet Christmas week, four anchor-handlers and nine PSVs spent New Year’s Eve moored in Aberdeen. Blessed by a stable high pressure across the North Sea, activities picked up through January with comparatively firm rates for PSVs, for example GBP 7,000 for a straight UT755. Sales and orders. The troubled Dutch/ Norwegian subsea-technology company

GBP 1,000 100

Source: Shipgaz Bergen, january, 2010

Offshore earnings

New term charters in the north sea: Shell UK Far Scotia psv ASCo Normand Flipper psv MLS North Stream psv BP N Aries Swan psv BP N Skandi Olympia psv BP N Edda Frigg psv Shell N Ocean Fighter psv Marathon UK Grampioan Explorer psv Esso N Strilmøy psv Esso N Stril Power ahts Gaz de France ER Athina psv Maersk O&G Edda Sprint psv Statoil Far Searcher psv Statoil Far Symphony psv DeepOcean Normand Flower psv

The North Ocean 102 was sold to the charterers Technip in September, and in December an agreement with McDermott International saw the sale of 50 per cent in North Ocean 103 and 75 per cent in North Ocean 105 to the American company.

6 months firm + opt, Dec 1 month firm + 2 mth opt, Dec 1 well firm + 2 wells opt, Dec 1 month firm + 3 weekly opt 1 month firm + opt, end Dec 4 weeks firm + d/d 14, end Dec extended until late 2010 1 year firm + 2 yrs opt, Jan extended 5 yrs extended 4 yrs well support Ensco 100 3 months extended 2 yrs, March extended 1 yr, April extended 3 months, April

Week 0 50 1 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 1

New term charters outside the North Sea: Petrobras Far Splendour psv extended 1 yr firm + 2x1 yrs opt, Brazil Petrobras Far Supporter psv 3 yrs firm, March 2010, Brazil Petrobras Far Sabre ahts 240 days firm, Brazil Petrobras Far UT731 tbn ahts 2 yrs Feb, Far Santana forerunner, Brazil AGR Maersk Traveller ahts 4 wells firm + opt, Falkland Islands Subocean Troms Pollux psv 1 month from mid Dec, Mediterranean ConocoPhillips Maersk Nomad psv 100 days support Stena Carron, Dec, Canada

Source: Shipgaz Bergen, JANUARY, 2010

The weeks up to Christmas saw a good volume of jobs, with rig moves paid up to GBP 12,000 per day. Also PSVs were in demand, and charterers were willing to pay a premium for large and well-fitted vessels.

Oceanteam ASA has a series of five large subsea vessels under construction in Spain. As a financial squeeze emerged, restructuring of the company debt was required, including a financial solution for three vessels.

no 1 2010 Shipgaz 17

Market Review 2008 ended with average VLCC earnings close to USD 100,000 per day according to Clarkson. This deteriorated during the first half of the year and in the summer VLCC owners transported oil to well below their costs. Supported by trader speculations that drew tankers to storage missions, a cold winter and low storage levels, rates improved for crude tankers and ended at Clarkson daily average revenue of USD 36,314. The average for all tankers was however dragged down by the miserable products tankers markets to USD 15,000. the Bulk mArket saw a trebling of the Baltic Dry Index, albeit from historically low levels. By the end of 2008, BDI stood

at 774. The end of 2009 noted 3,005 points. Time charter rates followed suit, with earnings for capesizes almost five-folded to USD 55,800 per day at the end of the year. 2010 will Also be a challenging year for most shipping sectors. There is a lot of optimism out there, but also a lot of question marks. And don’t forget that irrespective of economy growth and despite order cancellations and delays, there are many new vessels waiting to be delivered and for the shipping markets to absorb.

editor-in-Chief

Rolf P Nilsson rolf@shipgaz.com

Eidesvik has formed a joint-venture with CGGVeritas for two large seismic vessels under construction at Ulstein Verft. The French partner will have 49 per cent in Eidesvik Seismic Vessels and also take the vessels on twelve years time charter from delivery in 2010/2011.

Brevik shipyard for delivery in 2011/2012. The Havyard 832 PSV ordered by Havila from Simek in November was in fact a replacement for yard no 1682 from Fjellstrand whose hull failed to materialize from a Turkish shipyard. This vessel will go on charter to Maersk.

sinCe oCtoBer, eight offshore vessels have been ordered by Norwegian companies, four of them from Brazilian shipyards for time charter to Petrobras and owned by Siem Consub. Two UT776CD multipurpose service vessels were ordered by Island Offshore from STX Norway’s

hAVilA hAs Also purchased Saeborg, one of two similar vessel ordered by SupplyService PF of the Faroes and cancelled due to delays. This vessel was building with Havyard Tomrefjord (formerly Solstrand) and delivered as Havila Borg. dAg BAkkA Jr

New Worldscale rates at lower levels wet & dry The 2010 Worldscale flat rates came into effect at the beginning of the year. In average, they have been adjusted downwards to some 75 per cent of the 2009 levels.

ApArt from A short hike on some routes, VLCC rates have followed a negative trend the first weeks of the new year, but earnings are still well above the lows from summer 2008. Most large tanker sectors experienced a significant and positive development of earnings at the end of last year. By the end of week 3, Stockholm Chartering reported earnings at just below USD 40,000 for PG– UK/Cont. Suezmaxes followed suit with rates falling to WS 135 on the cross-med market, corresponding to earnings at USD 49,400 per day. Aframax rates in the North Sea improved however and for week 3, Stockholm Chartering reports WS 135 and USD 33,500 in daily earnings. the mArkets for products carriers have also improved substantially compared to the miserable summer of 2008. The Clarkson Handy average earnings stood at USD 23,405 on January 22. After a good start in the dry bulk markets, rates fell for capesizes, Clarksons reports. Average daily earnings for a 10-yearold Capesize varied between USD 37,700 and USD 40,682 in its three first weekly reports for 2010. on JAnuAry 22, the average rate for a 97/98-built Panamax stood at USD 24,776. At the same time, handymaxes traded at USD 30,500 per day on the transatlantic round-voyage trip charter market, some USD 16,000 below the average for 2008, but more than USD 10,000 above the average for 2009. rolf p nilsson

The 183-meter heavylift vessel Borealis, recently launched by Sembawang of Singapore, has been sold by Nordic Heavy Lift of Oslo to the Acergy offshore group. The vessel was ordered in May 2007 at USD 221 million with lifting capacity of 5,000 tons. Acergy has paid USD 260 million and will add accommodation capacity and cable-laying facilities for 2012 delivery.

End ’08

En ’09

Clean Tanker Index

839

633

mid-Jan ’10

898

Dirty Tanker Index

1252

815

1165

Baltic Dry Index

784

3023

3295

Source: BaLTic eXchange

BAltiC dry Bulk indiCes

Photo: pär-henrik sjöström

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 19

By Pär-Henrik Sjöström par-henrik@shipgaz.com

Laura Langh-Lagerlöf

Portrait

“There is no easy money in shipping” Being a shipowner’s daughter, Laura Langh-Lagerlöf never had a doubt on what to become. Today she leads the family enterprise Langh Ship together with her father – and she is set on getting the company growing. There are not many young women in leading positions in shipping. Laura Langh-Lagerlöf is one of the exceptions. She is most ambitious and has a great passion for her work. No doubt the apple never falls far from the tree. When the Finnish entrepreneur and shipowner Hans Langh bought his first own vessel on the secondhand market in 1984 it was named Laura after his eldest daughter. After that, Hans Langh has continued the tradition to name his ships after female family members. “As a matter of fact I remember our first Laura quite well. Even if I was not very old when we bought her, she stayed in the fleet until 1992”, Laura Langh-Lagerlöf recalls. “I visited the ship on several occasions either with the whole family or just together with my father. I know we also made some voyages with her.”

Laura has many fine memories from all the voyages she and her younger sister Linda have made on the Langh Ship vessels. “I enjoyed it very much and it was always a great adventure. I especially remember those journeys we made with our first newbuildings. We went

on round trips or then we travelled from Germany to Finland after having visited my cousins there.” Since the first newbuildings were delivered Laura and the rest of the family, including her grandmother Hjördis Langh, have always participated in the naming ceremonies. “All the naming ceremonies have of course remained in my memory. I was the godmother of the Sofia from the first batch from Sietas in 1989. She was named after me, as Sofia is my second name. I was also the godmother of the Laura, which was handed over in 1996, and she is still in our fleet.”

»Nowadays my father usually says that I am the one running the shipping company« The three legs of the Langh shipping business are: the shipowning company Langh Ship, the industry and ship cleaning company Hans Langh and Langh Ship Cargo Solutions, which offers specialized cargo units for steel products.

Laura and her sister Linda grew up on the family’s farm Alaskartano in Piikkiö (Pikis in Swedish) near Turku, where their father Hans started his career as a farmer before he entered shipping. Both the farm and the shipping activities have played an important role in Laura’s life. At the dining table, the family-owned

shipping company, as well as the affiliated ship cleaning company and the agricultural activities, were often subjects of discussions in which also the children were participating.

”It was quite natural for me. Actually I never reflected about the fact that we used to discuss different things than most of my friends’ families, such as buying and selling ships. We were also allowed to come to our father’s office after school. There we had a box with our things like pens and paper. I even remember on one occasion when I promptly wanted to participate in a meeting with the trade union. My father took me with him and a man at the table asked me kindly if I had nothing more interesting to do on my holiday from school.” The office of the Langh companies is situated in the main building of Alaskartano, a rustic yellow house, built more than a hundred years ago in a style that is very typical on the countryside in Finland. “Our grandmother lived in the same building, so we spent a lot of time here. Actually our family lived in this building too until I was five, then

20 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Portrait Laura Langh-Lagerlöf Photo: Pär-Henrik Sjöström

we moved to another house nearby on the premises”, Laura says. For Laura it has always been obvious that she would make a career in shipping. Already in secondary school she became more seriously involved in the company as a stand-in during summer vacations.

»I have never thought seriously about doing anything else. My intention is to get this company growing« The women

“For me, the shipping company has always been the most interesting part of the family business, although I liked the farming activities too. Before I went to high school I thought about going to an agricultural school, and for a while earlier I had even thought about a career at sea. But I continued school and then started studies in economics at School of Business and Economics at Åbo Akademi University.” Laura graduated as Master of Science (Economics) in 2003 and after that she worked for six months in Hamburg at the shipping agency Stüwe & Co. In 2005, she spent another six months at the HSH Nordbank in Hamburg at their shipping department.

“I mainly handled Greek customers and this was my first glimpse of shipping on a larger scale. The

The five ships in the Langh fleet of today are named Laura (after the eldest daughter), Aila and Marjatta (both after the mother), Linda (after the younger daughter) and Hjördis (after the grandmother).

work provided me with lots of valuable experience from many fields connected to shipping”, Laura says. Today, Laura Langh-Lagerlöf is Commercial Manager of Langh Ship and runs many of the daily routines in the shipping company. “One of my areas of responsibility is communication with our customers and also communication between our ships and our customers. In addition to that I work with new projects and continue with realising them if we decide to proceed.”

When the two latest newbuildings, the Aila and the Linda, were planned and built Laura held a key role in the project. A more recent project is for example marketing and sales of the products of Cargo Solutions, aiming at more efficient and safer shipments of steel products. Laura thinks that it has been rewarding to get such demanding tasks, thus gathering a lot of valuable experience.

“My father is a very skilful advisor. He offers the chance to take responsibility and I have taken over some of the tasks he used to do himself. This makes my own work even more interesting and challenging all the time.” When I ask Laura if the plan is that she one day will take over full responsibility of Langh Ship, she answers in her modest way that it is possible that her father has such plans.

“People often say to me that it must be hard to work together with your father, but as a matter of fact we have a very fine relationship. Nowadays my father usually says that I am the one running the shipping company, not he himself.” Laura wants to learn as much as possible about shipping, but when it comes to technical matters she feels that she has some limitations. “I have no technical training at all. Sometimes it is convenient to be a woman and just ask stupid questions. I confess that I don’t have a clue about how most of the technical equipment works on the ships.” However she thinks that the people on the vessels are good at explaining things. “I learn a lot of new things on

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 21

Laura Langh-Lagerlöf

Portrait Photo: Pär-Henrik Sjöström

»Of course there are also those who think that I am just the owner’s little daughter« board the ships. I visit them frequently and most of the people on board take me seriously even if it’s a man’s world. Of course there are also those who think that I am just the owner’s little daughter.”

The last year has been quite difficult in shipping, but Laura thinks that it also has done her good to experience another side of the activities. “Ever since I started the market had been booming, until autumn 2008. For me personally it has done me good to face hard times as well. It is important to realize that what goes up also must come down. There is no easy money in shipping.” The strategy of Langh Ship has all the time been to operate with long contracts and long-term customer relationships. This has made it somewhat easier to face the downturn, Laura thinks. “All our ships have been employed all the time, although one year ago there were very small volumes of outbound cargo. During this period we even made two voyages across the Atlantic with steel cargos. Lucky for us the charterer stayed with the contract.” Laura is more of a doer than a person that worries too much about everything. Now she has her mind focused on the future. In her opinion it is necessary to keep on a continuous renewal of the fleet. “I look forward to launching a newbuilding project again to keep our fleet competitive. Financing is no doubt the most difficult part right now, but the shipyards are extremely open for cooperation. Gone are the times when the shipyards dictated the conditions. Now they are forced to listen to us owners again.” Before entering a new project the company needs a charterer and a long-term contract. “It is difficult as there are a lot of free vessels on the market, available virtually for free. You need a special

Laura Langh-Lagerlöf is the godmother of the Laura, which is in the present fleet. idea, something that is not available on the market. Therefore we focus at different solutions”, Laura stresses and continues: “Indeed we do not have any concrete project going on right now, but we are always monitoring the market. I think that we will continue in the same niche with ice-strengthened vessels where our main knowledge is strongest. I think that our next generation of vessels will be somewhat larger than the present ones but still manned by small crews.”

The family is extremely important for Laura. Her husband is working with Tallink Silja, so there is a lot of talk about shipping in her home too. They have two boys, aged one and two and a half years respectively. Laura does not see any conflict between her role as a career woman and a mother. She has always been able to find a way to share her time between work and the family. “I have never lost touch with my job, not even when my sons were small babies. When the younger boy was born I was at the office a couple of days later, taking care of some things while my husband was at home with the children. I would probably have felt much more stress if I would have had to be away from my job during my parental leave. Already as babies I had the boys with me at the office. Now I take them with me when visiting the ships and I guess that they little by little will grow into the company in a similar way that I and my sister did. The older one already

The Langh inventions Hans Langh is known for his many inventions. For example the newbuildings from 1989 were the first in Europe to be designed with a system that allowed for quick cleaning of the cargo holds with hot water. The system enabled discharging of dirty bulk in the evening and loading of highly refined cargo in a clean and dry cargo hold by the next morning. Today, all vessels in the Langh fleet have the cleaning system.

builds container vessels from his Duplo blocks.” Beside her family and her work, Laura has a great passion for horse riding. She and her sister have been riding since they were little kids. Now also Laura’s husband has become interested in horses.

“The stable is next to our house and we have three horses there. My sister has a Finn horse and I have a German Warmblood together with my husband. Then there is of course our pony. Me and my husband bought the warmblood together already before we were engaged.” Laura thinks that an essential part of this hobby is not just riding, but also taking care of the horses. “We take care of the horses ourselves. It is an excellent relaxation from work. Also our kids love being at the stable although they are of course not riding themselves yet.” Laura and her family also spend a lot of time in their own motorboat during the summer. “We like to spend time in the archipelago. We often go to Iniö, where my parents have their summer place.” Still Laura does not see herself as particularly interested in boating and pleasure crafts. Her dreamboats are much larger, take several thousands of tons of cargo and employ a full crew. “I love my job and I have never regretted that I chose this career. I have never thought seriously about doing anything else. My intention is to get this company growing.”

22 Shipgaz No 1 2010

By Bent Mikkelsen bent@shipgaz.com

Newcomer Dan Swift

Photo: bent Mikkelsen

An unusual rebuild in place

The accommodation and support vessel Dan Swift marks J. Lauritzen’s re-entering into the offshore market. When J. Lauritzen’s Dan Swift left the shipyard at Frederikshavn at the end of November 2009, it was in fact the second time that the ship left the quayside as brand new. The first time was 24 years ago in September 1985, when the ship was delivered as the Mercandian Continent for the Mercandia Group. There is not much resemblance between the Mercandian Continent and Dan Swift apart from the hull shape. All other structures have been altered and rebuilt to its present form.

The Dan Swift is J. Lauritzen’s first vessel after the decision to re-enter the offshore market, which J. Lauritzen left 15 years ago, in 1994. It is also the very first passenger vessel in the com-

pany’s 125-year history. The Dan Swift is called an ASV – Accommodation and Support Vessel – and will work as a floating hotel with workshops on location anywhere on the globe. The Dan Swift is fixed for its first job for Norwegian StatoilHydro for the hook-up on the Brazilian Peregrino field in the Campos Basin. The field is located some 85 km from the coastline and the water depth is 100 metres. The Dan Swift will be part of the installation of two production wells with a distance between them of 10 km. The contract will run for a period of 14 months.

»It is a very lucrative contract with no option for further periods«

Anders Mortensen, CEO of Lauritzen Offshore.

“It is a very lucrative contract with no option for further periods”, says Anders Mortensen, CEO of Lauritzen Offshore Services. “We are quite confident that we will find other work for our new units, which are amongst the most advanced in the world.”

Next year the Peregrino field and its two wells will be served by an FPSO (Floating Production Storage Offloading) unit, which will be provided by Maersk Contractors for a contract period of 24 years. J. Lauritzen contacts on the Brazilian offshore market go back to the mid-1990s, when several in the top management of Lauritzen Offshore Services were employed in Quantum Tankers and they landed the first con-

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 23

Dan Swift

Newcomer Photo: bent Mikkelsen

»We got a lot of experience working with Brazilian Petrobras« tract for an offshore-shuttle tanker for a Brazilian oil field. “We got a lot of experience working with Brazilian Petrobras”, says Erik Møller, project manager on the Dan Swift rebuild. “We have taken all this into account on the Dan Swift project, but in fact added at lot more technicalities when it became clear that we had landed a contract with StatoilHydro. During the years of rebuilding, several other contracts were in the picture where we had to take details into consideration, but all in all we are satisfied with the StatoilHydro contract. The combination of Petrobras and StatoilHydro means that we start off at a very high level of safety standards.”

The adventure of the Dan Swift started in 2004, when Lauritzen Tankers got an invitation to participate in an offshore tender in Brazil. Shortly after, the company got a cheap offer to purchase a partly rebuilt vessel in Rijeka, Croatia. The vessel was the cable layer Kraka, which was owned by a company care of Alcatel Submarine Networks in Copenhagen. The vessel had arrived at Victor Lenac Shipyard in 2000, with the intention of being rebuilt as a cable-laying vessel, but during the rebuild a lot of things went wrong between the owner of the ship and the shipyard and its management. The dispute ended in arbitration, but with the vessel still only half rebuilt standing in a floating dock in Rijeka. The shipyard refused to make the ship ready for sea in order to put pressure on the owner. Alcatel Submarine eventually gave up the ship. It was sold to J. Lauritzen and towed away from Rijeka. “We had to move the vessel away form Croatia”, explains Erik Møller. “Looking back on the project I must admit that it would have been easier to build a completely new ship from the beginning. But it would not have been realistic, as it was in the middle of a building boom with several years’ waiting time for a slot at a shipyard,

The heli-deck on top of aft deck is capable of taking Sikorsky S-92 or Super Puma class helicopters. so a semi-rebuilt vessel with DP was a fine option for us.” During 2005 and 2006, the specification for the rebuild was made in cooperation with German shipyard Blohm & Voss, Hamburg, which won the tender for the project. In September 2007 the Dan Swift finally arrived at Hamburg in tow from Trieste, where it was laid up after the purchase in 2004. The Dan Swift can accommodate 256 persons in the passenger category, meaning persons not part of the ship’s crew (safety manning is 16 persons without catering crew). The cabins vary from single bed spacious cabins for top executive supervisors to four-berth cabins for blue-collar workers – still with private facilities. All told there are 84 cabins on board. “The number of persons we can accommodate has no reference to any kind of contract or job, but is simply the number of beds that could be fit-

Lauritzen offshore In 2008, Lauritzen Offshore Services was established as a new business unit within advanced dynamically positioned (DP2) vessels to support the rapidly growing markets in the offshore oil exploration and production sectors.

ted into the available space on board”, says Erik Møller. “None of the cabins are standard cabins, but all are built on the spot (but with standard bathrooms) in order to fit into the hull.”

The vessel has been fitted with some very spacious changing rooms. The up to 256 workers normally work in two shifts, which means that up to 125 persons can use the facilities at the same time. So when it is lunchtime, up to 125 persons could be coming on to the Dan Swift to have their meal. “It requires more square metres than expected to give enough space for these people to come on board and change clothes before going into the mess rooms”, says Erik Møller. The ship has also been fitted with recreation facilities with a library and Internet café with ten workstations, which are online 24 hours a day for the crew’s benefit. Part of the facili-

24 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Newcomer Dan Swift Photo: bent Mikkelsen

The Dan Swift is equipped with two hydraulic gangways reaching up to 40 metres. ties is also a cinema with 75 seats and a gymnasium with all kinds of workout equipment and health care. The external workforce on the Brazilian Peregrino field will be up to 90 per cent Brazilian citizens, which is part of the requirements from Petrobras, so the Dan Swift’s catering crew will be Brazilian.

“In order to work in the Brazilian offshore waters it is part of the requirements that some percentage of crew are Brazilian citizens”, says Erik Møller. “This is acquired by using a Brazilian sub-supplier on the catering side on board the Dan Swift when it is in operation.” Apart from being a hotel ship with accommodation, the Dan Swift also functions as a floating workshop. Under the main deck the old cable tanks – as a cable layer the ship was able to load up to 11,000 km of cable – have been converted to workshops. The aft deck can also be used as a workplace or extra workshops in containers can be stored on deck. A 100-

Lauritzen in Brazil Lauritzen Offshore Services’ shuttle tanker the Dan Eagle is already in Brazil, forerunning two 69,000 DWT shuttle tankers under construction at Nantong, China, for delivery in the summer of 2011 and late 2011. The two tankers will ship crude oil from FPSO’s offshore to storage facilities ashore.

ton knuckle boom crane covers the deck, which was a last minute installation on board the Dan Swift. “We worked in a project with a customer that wanted a 300-ton crane. We added sponson tanks to the ship’s hull to make it more stable. This particular contract did not come through and we found a brand new 100-ton crane instead”, says Erik Møller. Part of the facilities is also a number of offices, which can be given to the customers on request. The same goes for conference rooms and even video-conference rooms on board.

“We have spent a large sum of money to provide the Dan Swift with the latest and most modern satellite based video communication equipment. No doubt that communication has a central role in modern business”, explains Erik Møller. As the Dan Swift has been classified as a passenger ship, it has been fitted with full life-saving capacity on each side of the ship. On each side two lifeboats with a capacity of

150 persons have been installed. They have been secured by special steel constructions, as the Danish Maritime Authorities feared that the boat could be damaged by steel constructions handled on the aft deck. “It is one of the claims, where we think that it is more in theory than in practice that damage could occur”, says Erik Møller. The connection with the offshore installation is done via two hydraulic gangways; one installed on the front of the accommodation house and one on the port side of ship, close to the middle of the length of the ship. “There is a rather simple philosophy behind the two gangways”, says Erik Møller. “It is well known technology, but for the first time installed on board a mono-hull vessel, which is much cheaper to use than the traditional semi-sub rigs used for the same kind of job.”

The gangway in front of the accommodation house is used typically when the Dan Swift connects with an

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 25

Dan Swift

Newcomer Photo: bent Mikkelsen

»We added sponson tanks to the ship’s hull to make it more stable« installation standing on the seabed. The Dan Swift will then be lying in DP mode at some distance, while the connection is made ahead of the ship. The maximum reach for the gangway construction is 38 metres (40 metres absolute maximum) at angles ranging from 22 degrees upward or 16 degrees downwards.

The gangway rests physically on the offshore construction, while hydraulic cylinders compensate for movements. The Dan Swift can keep station in up to four metres of swell and wind up to 15 metres per second. The other gangway installed on the port side will be used typically when the Dan Swift is hooked up to an FPSO lying in four mooring station. Then it is easier to keep station lying parallel with the tanker in its moorings. On the Brazilian contract it is already known that the Dan Swift will

The special stern was part of the conversion to cable layer, but remains in its new role. aft deck is capable of taking Sikorsky S-92 or Super Puma helicopters. Furthermore the vessel will have one weekly call by a supply vessel from the mainland. The supply vessel will provide all

have communication with shore up to several times every week.

It is planned for a helicopter service to call the vessel three times per week. The heli-deck on top of the

Born to perform for efficiency and environment

TÄRNTANK REDERI AB Vestre Strandvej 10 9990 Skagen DENMARK +45 98 40 70 60

www.tarntank.dk

26 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Newcomer Dan Swift Photo: bent Mikkelsen

»The last minute solution was to build a helicopter lounge« kinds of supplies from diesel oil for the propulsion engines to freshwater and provisions and spare parts. It is also planned for components for the hook-up on Peregrino to be shipped to the Dan Swift by this weekly call. The StatoilHydro requirement also caused some extra work in Frederiks havn. It turned out that the charterers had a much higher standard of accommodation for a helicopter lounge. “We had fitted some space near the entrance to the accommodation as a helicopter lounge, but we had to change the standard. The last minute solution was to build a StatoilHydroapproved helicopter lounge in three containers on the weather deck at the end of the stairway from the helideck”, says Erik Møller.

The propulsion system on board the Dan Swift is rather unique, with five Azimuth thrusters and three tunnel thrusters. The three Azimuth thrusters aft provide the power for transit sailing from A to B. All told the service sailing speed is not impressive, only 12.5 knots, but the installation is mostly to keep station under DP. The transit propulsion can use the two retractable thrusters in the front of the ship as extras, when the water depth is sufficient. The three tunnel thrusters in the bow were part of the rebuild to a cable-laying vessel at the beginning of the century. They cannot be used while sailing, only while station keeping. The thrusters are powered by the

Filipino crew working with installation of the gymnasium.

The mission The Dan Swift is fixed for its first job for Norwegian StatoilHydro for the hook-up on the Brazilian Peregrino field in the Campos Basin. The field is located some 85 km from the coastline and the water depth is 100 metres.

original MaK engine, which in the ship’s previous life was used for singlescrew propulsion. Now it is converted into a genset. Furthermore, a new engine room containing four brand new B&W/Holeby engines. All told, the propulsion plant generates around 13,900 kW.

While on station in front of the installation in the Peregrino field, the command is taken on the aft part of the wheelhouse on top of the accommodation house. There is a limited view from the workstations, but the two DP officers on duty monitor the situation from the computer screens. “When the ship is in operation there will be one operator constantly on alert in his dedicated chair in front of the panels, while the duty colleague is doing the lookout through

the windows”, says Erik Møller. “Apart from the manual watchkeeping, the system monitoring the gangway has a built-in escape system. If the swell and wind go beyond a certain mark, the hydraulic system will automatically lift the gangway and back off the vessel.” It will be completely safe to let the ship do it by itself, but in practice the operator on duty would have done it before it reaches this point.

The Dan Swift is sailed by a mixed crew of Danish officers and some Danes in the catering crew, while the rest of the crew is Filipino, Polish and later Brazilians. The grand total on board will be 291 persons, of whom 256 will be workers. The remaining 35 are crew, of whom 16 are the safety manning crew and the rest catering crew.

From ro-ro to cable layer to ASV The Dan Swift was originally delivered from Frederikshavn Værft as the Mercandian Continent in September 1985. It was built as a ro-ro vessel for international trade, with some 2,100 lane metres on four decks. The vessel was named by TV entertainer Otto Leisner as part of Mercandia’s scheme to use

male sponsors for the ships. The ro-ro measured 160 metres over all and had a tonnage of 15,375 gt with 9,250 DWT.

The Mercandian Continent continued sailing under Danish flag until December 1995, when Mercandia closed its operation. The Mercandian Continent was

sold to Japanese NYK Bulkship (Singapore) for use as a car-feeder vessel in the Far East area, under the name of Roro Sentosa. The next sale took place in 2000, when NYK sold the vessel to Alcatel Submarine Network with the intention of rebuilding the vessel as a cable laying/repair vessel under the name of Kraka.

All plans were in hand when the Kraka arrived at Victor Lenac Shipyard, Rijeka, on August 16, 2000. Shortly afterwards the vessel was taken into a floating dock to be shortened by some 16 metres in order to fit in the ports used by Alcatel. Then the problems between shipyard and shipowner started.

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 27

Dan Swift

Newcomer

1. A 100-ton knuckle boom crane was a last minute installation. 2. The vessel has been fitted with some very spacious changing rooms. 3. The Dan Swift is equipped with a DP-system, among other things. 4. Part of the very special equipment on board are the floor gratings with the company logo.

Dan Swift Type .............................................. Passenger ship Port of Registry . ............................ Copenhagen Classification .DNV 1A1, E0, Heldk-sh, DynposAuthr, Naut-OC, Clean, BWM-E(s), Comf-V (3) Length, o a ................................................ 149.5 m

Length, b p ................................................ 132.6 m Breadth ..................................................... 22.32 m Draught ............................................................ 7 m Depth to 1 deck ....................................... 12.35 m Displacement .................................. 13,600 tons

Deckspace ............................................. 860 sq m Workshops ............................................ 350 sq m Speed......................................................... 12 knots Consumption at service speed ............20 tons Consumption in DP mode ............... 15â&#x20AC;&#x201C;25 tons

28 Shipgaz no 1 2010

By Pierre Adolfsson pierre@shipgaz.com

Report Seafarers‘ health

Photo: jörgen SPrång

Obesity – a safety issue at sea

Obesity among seafarers is a growing issue in the Nordic countries. It is not only a danger to health, it also represents a risk during emergency and safety operations. Last autumn, marine physician Torleiv Kvalvik put the spotlight on obesity among Norwegian seafarers and the safety risks this brings about. “The Norwegian Maritime Directorate asked me to highlight the subject at the conference on safety at sea in Haugesund in September, as they considered it an area of interest. It was actually the very first time the relation between safety and overweight/ obesity was discussed as an isolated subject. Today, there is little research on the relation between overweight and fitness for duty. And as a doctor, one’s arguments should be based on valid facts. However, I do think it’s important to raise this subject.” Since 1965, the percentage of Norwegians with a BMI, Body Mass Index, exceeding 30 has steadily in-

creased – and seafarers are no exception. “I’ve been working as a marine physician since 1984 and the trend is evident; overweight and obesity are increasing among men within the shipping industry. If you take a closer look at individual weight curves covering the last ten years, one can easily see an upward weight trend among quite a few.”

»To carry an injured crewmember weighing 150 kg on a stretcher or with your bare hands might cause you a lot of problems« Dr Torleiv Kvalvik, marine physician.

Norwegian seafarers with a BMI exceeding 35 could have their health certificate withdrawn, if they are not

granted an exemption. Without an exemption one could hardly apply for a job within the maritime sector involving work at sea. The Norwegian Maritime Directorate is currently revising the health regulations for seafarers.

“To my knowledge, no one has been denied an exemption when applying. One should bear in mind that we are talking about quite a few applications. As long as every person applying for an exemption gets one, I suggest we raise the upper BMI limit to 40 instead. If we are to apply the BMI 40 limit, we should not issue any exemptions for persons exceeding the limit. I also suggest that we introduce an upper limit for waist circumference. Short persons suffering from obesity

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 29

Seafarers‘ health

Report

Torleiv Kvalvik points at several situations where obesity could be a safety issue, both for the seafarer himself as well as the safety of the ship. “You don’t need to do a lot of research to understand it’s twice as hard to carry a man weighing 150 kg, compared to a man weighing only 75 kg. If you are to carry an injured crewmember weighing 150 kg on a stretcher or with your bare hands, it might cause you a lot of problems, especially if the person is lying inside the engine room and you need to evacuate the vessel immediately.” “In critical situations, such as evacuation by helicopter, a heavy body might cause considerable problems for the rescue personnel, particularly if the person in question is injured”, he says and continues: “Within the offshore industry the

Photo: Kjell Strand / Haugesunds Avis

have an almost ball-shaped belly. They will act as a stopper when trying to get through a manhole. Of course this will affect safety on board.” “I’m not 100 per cent sure this is the right strategy, but as we are issuing so many exemptions it’s necessary to reconsider the regulations. We could keep the current BMI limit and practise it strictly, with no room for exemptions. However, as many persons with obesity have a satisfactory physical condition and are fit to serve on board, it would be unfair to rule them out.”

use of a helicopter is common. What if the helicopter crashes into the water and you need to evacuate it as fast as possible, but can’t get through as a person suffering from heavy overweight blocks the way out? This example is pushed to the extreme, but we might actually see situations like that.”

»If we are to apply the BMI 40 limit, we should not issue any exemptions for persons exceeding the limit« Dr Torleiv Kvalvik, marine physician.

Another area that raises concern is safety equipment, according to Torleiv Kvalvik. “Quickly donning a survival suit 61 per cent of those working on passenger vessels and 53 per cent of those working on cargo vessels suffer from overweight or obesity.

45 43

35 Cargo vessels All

Normal weight, %

Overweight, %

18 Cargo vessels

Passenger vessels

39 All

All

Cargo vessels

Obesity, %

From the study “Research on dietary, physical activities and health among Swedish seagoing personnel” by Margarita Moreno and Nestor Ramallo.

can be difficult for a person with a large body, in addition to which the survival suit may not fit the person. I’m not sure if all safety equipment is adjusted to fit people suffering from obesity, as there has been little spotlight on the general weight increase among seamen. We should look into this systematically as the older weight standard chart for men corresponds badly to today’s situation. We have people working on board weighing 130–150 kg. Are lifeboats and life jackets suited to them? Do shipping companies exchange lifeboats and life jackets when their crewmembers get bigger and bigger?”

Some Norwegian shipping companies have launched employee health assistance programmes. Knutsen OAS has initiated a new health project providing assistance and guidance within areas such as diet and exercise for the crew on the tanker Anneleen Knutsen. Today more than 50 per cent of the ship’s crew are taking part in training sessions at least twice a week. Earlier this year a ‘Doctor’s guidance’, conducted by the British

30 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Report Seafarers‘ health Photo: Jörgen Språng

British Maritime and Coastguard Agency pinpoints inability to undertake arduous emergency tasks such as fire-fighting as one of the risk factors that come with overweight or obesity. Maritime and Coastguard Agency on immediate risks from obesity, was published. It presents several areas of concern, many of which Torleiv Kvalvik also mentions. The risks include:

Inability to undertake arduous emergency tasks such as fire-fighting, evacuation from the vessel and recovering people from the water in small vessels such as yachts; Difficulty in entering and leaving restricted spaces, during normal duties and especially if needing rescue because of collapse or injury; Increased risk of injury from falls and of acute illness and incapacity while at sea; Inability to fit into protective clothing and life-saving equipment; Exceeding the design standards for equipment used to work at heights and for use in life-threatening situations, for instance emergency chutes and free fall lifeboats. The report concludes: “Obesity that interferes with the safe performance of normal or emergency duties or which carries a risk of incapacitation

»Firemen need to comply with security requirements; we therefore examine our crewmembers’ physical fitness«

Dr Monica Widell at Feelgood, working with Stena Line.

while working at sea prior to the next medical, which is such that it is considered unacceptable in terms of the individual or the safe and efficient operation of the vessel, is a valid reason for making a seafarer unfit or for restricting their duties.”

The ‘Doctor’s guidance’ presents several approaches to fitness assessment, among other things it proposes a fixed BMI limit, as in Norway. In Sweden the comprehensive study “Research on dietary, physical activities and health among Swedish seagoing personnel” was published at the beginning of 2009. It clearly shows that health problems among seafarers employed on Swedish vessels are quite common. 61 per cent of passenger vessels’

personnel suffer from obesity or overweight, while the corresponding figure for cargo vessels is 53 per cent. The study covers seven Swedish shipping companies and was published by the health and lifestyle assessments company MAT-IQ. “Without a balanced lifestyle seafarers become vulnerable, which translates into inefficiency and drops the focus on the job in hand as well as general concentration to dangerous levels. Consequently safety and productivity is compromised by destructive personal behaviour”, says nutritionist Nestor Ramallo, who together with the colleague, Margarita Moreno, performed the study. Nestor Ramallo points out that shipping companies need to focus more on human resources and realize that quality work is not only about quality shipping.

“For balanced nutrition and a healthy lifestyle on board, the Maritime Labour Convention provides long overdue and supportive preconditions to initiate and implement the

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 31

Seafarers‘ health

Report Photo: Jörgen Språng

»Overweight or obesity could affect the ability to move and to use safety equipment« company’s health policy. Access to healthy food and well being on board is essential for ‘fitness for duty’. And it is good business, leading to gains in productivity and morale, prevention of accidents and reductions in healthcare costs. The safety and efficiency of the vessel depends upon the skill, vigilance and physical/medical fitness of the seafarers.”

Some years ago, the North of England P&I club became one of the first to develop dietary recommendations for seafarers. According to the P&I club a balanced diet, adequate sleep, regular exercise and good hygiene help prevent diseases, improve the health and hence also help promote safety on board. Obesity, worsening health due to SSSP_Shipgaz_184x118mm.pdf consumption of too much sugar and 1

high cholesterol levels caused by eating too much fat, were said to be common problems among seafarers. One of Sweden’s leading marine physicians, Monica Widell at the health and wellness training company Feelgood, emphasizes that obesity first and foremost is a danger to one’s 2010-01-22 12.48 health.

Obesity could affect the use of safety equipment.

“Considerable overweight or obesity increases the risks of developing vascular diseases such as heart attacks”, she says and continues:

“Overweight or obesity could affect the ability to move and to use safety equipment. If you’re to help other crewmembers evacuate the

STENA SONANGOL IS OPENING A NEW OFFICE IN RIO DE JANEIRO STENA SONANGOL SUEZMAX POOL is a unique joint venture

between Stena Bulk, a leading international innovative tanker owner and Sonangol, the Angolan National Oil Company that manages Angola´s energy resources. The opening of its new office in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil is the latest step in Stena Sonangol´s commitment to this important market and business in South America. www.stenasonangol.com

S T E N A S O N A N G O L – A J O I N T V E N T U R E C O M PA N Y

HOUSTON • RIO DE JANEIRO • NEW YORK • LUANDA • LONDON • ATHENS • GOTHENBURG • HELSINKI • SINGAPORE • BEIJING

32 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Report Seafarers‘ health Photo: Jörgen Språng

ship, but aren’t able to put on the fireman’s suit, one can talk about serious safety problems. And if you are about to evacuate a heavy crewmember suffering from a broken leg, it might cause serious problems when taking him to the helicopter, especially if the crewmember is lying inside the engine room.” Swedish regulations do not include any BMI limit. However, Monica Widell would welcome such an initiative.

“Yes, I’m positive to a BMI limit in Sweden as well. However, when the approved limit is exceeded, an extended examination has to be carried out. Is this person able to perform safety tasks? The health certificate might be imposed with a time limit if one exceeds the BMI limit, so the specific crewmember needs to target his health issues.” “One has to remember that BMI is only one of many health factors.

»Today we prescribe physical activities. The employee gets a personal fitness coach and an individual action plan« bmi Body mass index (BMI) is a measurement which compares weight and height. It defines people as overweight when their BMI is between 25 kg/m2 and 30 kg/m2, and obese when it is greater than 30 kg/m2. (Source: Wikipedia)

When I perform medical examinations, several factors are taken into account; overweight is one of them, of course. I always discuss lifestyle related topics such as smoking, exercising and weight when examining seamen. I rarely receive any negative response by doing so.” Swedish Stena Line pinpointed the relation between safety and overweight/obesity some years ago and the company has targeted firemen on board, among other things. They work closely with Feelgood. “Firemen need to comply with security requirements; we therefore execute different tests to examine our crewmembers’ physical fitness. We

give support to those who fail to meet the requirements; if someone suffers from obesity we offer help.”

“Today we prescribe physical activities. The employee gets a personal fitness coach and an individual action plan is worked out with the assistance of the consultant.” Other Swedish shipping companies are running similar projects; the Swedish Shipowners’ Employer Association supports several surveys, where health matters are discussed, such as fat levels in diet. According to Lars Andersson, General Manager of the association, health issues and safety risks it brings about need to be highlighted in Sweden as well as in many other countries. “It’s a serious but hidden problem. Unfortunately no one dares to raise the issue, as it’s a very sensitive subject. No one wants to hear that ‘your fatness is a safety issue’.” Heikki Sarni, MD, PhD, Adjunct

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 33

Seafarers‘ health

Report

“Overweight increases the risk of sleep apnea, which in turn could jeopardize safety when steering the vessel, as you could fall asleep. The ability to evacuate might also be in danger. Are you fit enough to climb up the ladder, are you able to get through a hatch measuring 60x60 centimetres? And if a person suffering from overweight needs to be evacuated from the engine room, who will manage to carry him?” he asks and continues: “Overweight makes it more difficult to obtain suitable survival suits. If the crew are getting fatter, it also affects the space in lifeboats when evacuating; especially the space in free-fall lifeboats is confined.” The Finnish maritime industry does not apply a BMI index. According to Heikki Sarni it is more important to assess a person’s fitness for duty than strictly to apply a BMI index. “ILO is renewing its guidelines for conducting seafarers’ medical examinations. It’s still on the drawing board, but it seems evident that it will not include any weight restriction. The reason is that fitness for duty must be crucial, not a separate value or index.” Preventive measures to combat overweight and obesity among seamen are put into practice in Finland.

Photo: Jörgen Språng

Professor and Chief Medical Officer at the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health recognises several areas, where overweight might cause serious safety risks at sea, besides the danger to health.

»It’s a very sensitive subject. No one wants to hear that ‘your fatness is a safety issue’« “The galleys on our vessels are told to serve healthy food with a low percentage of fat and salt. The seafarers have also been given information on healthy food. The Seafarers’ Pension Fund and the Finnish Seamen’s Service (MEPA) have been involved in projects targeting good health. The results so far do not show an unequivocal reduction in the seafarers’ overall weight. However, it seems that the weight increase has become weaker.” Like Norway, Denmark applies a

Lars Andersson, general manager at the Swedish Shipowners’ Employer Association.

Danish study highlights safety risks A study conducted by Seahealth Denmark some years ago, comprising 1,257 male Nordic seafarers (95 per cent were Danish), revealed a disturbing situation. There were statistically significant more overweight seafarers in all age groups compared to a reference group ashore. Among those between 45 and 66 years of age, 76.6 per cent had a weight above normal, while 30.9 per cent of this age group was obese.

The study showed that obesity, besides its influence on health, might be a safety issue at sea, even if no concrete incidents were discussed, as “proper documentation is sparse”. However, the study stated:

“It may be difficult for obese persons to perform safety tasks aboard in emergencies, to use escape routes and ladders and to enter a lifeboat or a life raft. This can be crucial not only for the obese persons, but also for those depending on their actions or are involved in assisting them”

Furthermore: “An obese person may have an excess risk of acute disease. The possibility for medical treatment at sea is reduced compared to shore based workers. This may be a serious problem to the seafarer with an acute disease but also to the ship and others who may be involved in evacuation or other activities initiated to rescue an ill seafarer at sea.”

fixed BMI limit. However, in Denmark a BMI level exceeding 40 shall cause a specific evaluation, according to Connie S Gehrt, Managing Director at the Danish occupational health service company Seahealth Denmark. “If the conclusion of the evaluation is that the fat and muscle distribution is a severe limitation to mobility, it can either be an absolute rejection or a possible time limitation of the certificate.”

Persons who sign on for the first time, i.e. have not worked at sea before, those who have not worked on board a ship within the last five years as well as all seafarers and fishermen below the age of 18 will get an absolute rejection if their BMI exceeds the limit and the evaluation shows that it is a severe limitation to mobility. Seafarers and fishermen who meet these criteria and for whom the maritime or fishing business must be considered their main occupation, may get a time-limited health certificate even if their BMI is too high. Connie S Gehrt is not aware of any case in Denmark where incidents at sea have been directly caused by obesity, but she thinks that shipowners should take the risks into account.

“It is important that the shipowners consider risks regarding overweight/obesity among their crews and for instance provide suf-

34 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Report Seafarers‘ health Photo: seahealth Denmark

»We are running a project with Royal Arctic Line, Esvagt and the University of Southern Denmark« ficient life saving equipment for larger sizes than normal. Concrete examples of emergency situations where obesity has been a problem is hard to find, but on the other hand it has been a discussion in Denmark for years whether the BMI limit of 40 ought to be lower”, she says and continues: “It is important to make clear that we see obesity also in a broader angle than safety. It is really about well-being and living a long and good life.”

Connie S Gehrt, speaking at Seahealth Denmark’s yearly conference MSSM in Nyborg 2008.

Seahealth Denmark has initiated several health projects targeting sea personnel. ”We are running a project with Royal Arctic Line, Esvagt and the

POWER FOR MARINE PROFESSIONALS

University of Southern Denmark on methods to promote health and wellbeing in the maritime field. “We have also issued a cookbook and at the moment we are running a calendar on nutrition, exercise and giving up smoking. The calen-

dar has been sent out to all ships. Besides the above, we have provided a health management system and we offer courses and help organize processes for nutrition, exercise and giving up smoking adapted to specific needs.”

Volvo Penta professional service centre in Sweden: ÖCKERÖ MITAB Tel: +46 (0)31 7691430 Fax: +46 (0)31 965950 Email: magnus.hansson@ mitabmarin.se Web: www.mitabmarin.se SIMRISHAMN Marincenter Syd Simrishamn AB Tel: +46 (0)414 28790 Fax: +46 (0)414 28799 Email: sven@marincentersyd.se Web: www.marincentersyd.se WAXHOLM Rindö Marine AB Tel: +46 (0)8 544 306 30 Fax: +46 (0)8 544 306 49 Email: info@rindomarine.se Web: www.rindomarine.se

Please visit www.volvopenta.com for more information Volvo Penta has a wide range of engines with high reliability, high performance and operational economy for heavy duty professionals. 81 to 552 kW, 3–16 litres. And what’s more, the owners of our engines will have easy access to qualified service and support.

GRIMALDI LINES

The Leading RO/RO Carrier The new generation of Grimaldi Lines vessels, have proven to be extremely effective and are the most t echnologically advanced RO/RO multipurpose c arriers on the Northern European, Mediterranean, South American and West African sea routes. The service speed is 19–20 knots to ensure the fastest transit time and to tie the vessels to programmed calls as scheduled. As a Grimaldi Lines customer you can count on: n Fast transit times, bringing your overseas m arket closer to you n Competitive rates n High level of damage protection by skilled GRIMALDI LINES staff, a guarantee for the safety of your cargo n Regular sailings: Mediterranean Service fixed-day sailings every 7 days, South American Service regular sailings every 10 days, West African Service regular sailings every 7 days All of which add up to a first class service to the benefit of your products and trade.

The GRIMALDI LINES RO/RO vessels can carry cars – all kinds of vehicles – standard and special c ontainers – forest products – general cargo – p roject cargo. GRIMALDI EURO MED SERVICE ports of call: Wallhamn – Esbjerg – Antwerp – Southampton – Portbury – Cork – Livorno – Salerno – Palermo – Valletta – Tunis – Piraeus – Izmir – Ashdod – Haifa – Limassol – Alexandria – Savona – Setubal – Lattakia – Tartous – Beirut – Mersin – Khoms GRIMALDI SOUTH AMERICAN SERVICE ports of call: Hamburg – Antwerp – Le Havre – Bilbao – T ilbury – Southampton – Setubal – Salvador – Rio de Janeiro – Santos – Paranagua – Buenos Aires – Zarate – Montevideo – Asuncion GRIMALDI WEST AFRICAN SERVICE ports of call: Hamburg – Antwerp – Le Havre – Tilbury – A msterdam – Casablanca – Dakar – Banjul – F reetown – Abidjan – Tema – Pointe Noire – Lome – Cotonou – Lagos – Douala – Boma – Luanda – Takoradi – Lobito – Conakry Scandinavia is served by feeders for the South American and West African services.

For further information and bookings please contact Grimaldi Maritime Agencies Sweden AB P.O.Box 2185, SE-403 13 Gothenburg, Sweden Tel. no +46(0)31-60 72 80 Fax. no +46(0)31-13 57 24 Web site www.grimaldisweden.se

Nominated by Lloyd’s Loading List as Deep Sea Ro/Ro Line of the year 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 2005, 2006, 2007

36 Shipgaz no 7 2009

By Rolf P Nilsson, rolf@shipgaz.com

Spotlight IMO

No news for shipping from COP15 consultations to be held post-Copenhagen, the required consensus on action needed to be taken to save the planet will be reached at the next Conference. IMO will continue with its work, and according to Mitropolous, the outcome of COP15 will be studied to see if it will have any repercussions on shipping and the IMO work. This study will be presented to the next meeting of the IMO Marine Environment Protection Committee, MEPC, due to be held in March. The new situation without any binding agreements from the COP15 opens up for several possible scenarios for shipping.

IMO: Rolf P Nilsson Rolf P Nilsson, Editor-in-Chief of Shipgaz, points the spotlight at IMO in each issue. Check this column to get the latest updates on what’s up in the IMO chambers.

he outcome of the UN Climate Change Conference, COP15, held in Copenhagen in December last year, became a disappointment to most people. The three-page Accord signed by the world leaders did not mention shipping at all, and there are lots of speculations going around on what will happen now. In a comment on the COP15, the IMO secretary-general Efthimios E Mitropolous said:

“Like many others, who have made comments on the outcome of COP 15, I have viewed the end result of the Copenhagen Conference with mixed feelings: with concern that

ECSA REGRET “Whilst some progress has been made the shipping industry regrets that no clarity has been created on the treatment of international shipping in the process of reducing CO2 to which the shipping industry is committed”, comments ECSA in a newsletter.

»The three-page Accord signed by the world leaders did not mention shipping at all« the target initially pursued, following the 2007 Bali Conference, of a legally binding instrument was not achieved; with measured satisfaction that, through the Accord tabled at the end of the deliberations, a step in the right direction was taken enabling progress to be made towards a legally binding instrument; and with hope that, following new rounds of Photo: eU CoMMISSIon AUDIoVISUAL SerVICe

On the positive side is the possibility for IMO to take the lead and if successful, the UN agency can present a solution for shipping at the next Climate Change Conference that is acceptable for the world. In fact, this is necessary if shipping is to avoid regional rules. The EU Commission has threatened to impose a European solution if IMO does not deliver a framework before the end of this year. Recent reports from Brussels indicate however that there is no consensus among the member states on a joint EU approach at next IMO MEPC meeting. A group of states have refused to sign a position paper from the EU Commission. The paper has been developed by the directorategeneral for transport and was not seen as controversial. The member states that refuse to

The IMO Secretary-General Efthimios E Mitropoulos had mixed feelings after COP15.

sign include large shipping nations such as Greece, UK, Denmark, Germany, Cyprus and Malta. According to observers, the reason for the refusal is not that those member states do not back the proposals in the paper, but have had a hard time accepting the way it was presented and the short planning time. This also boils down to the lengthy power struggle between the EU Commission on one side, favouring a

No 7 2009 Shipgaz 37

IMO

Spotlight Photo: Jörgen Språng

system where the commission represents the entire union in the IMO, and maritime member states that want to keep the competence and influence at national level on the other side. The member states that oppose the paper are many enough to form a socalled blocking minority. What could be bad for shipping is that this may result in a transfer of the issue from the directorate-general for transport to the directorate-general for environment.

The US is also on its way, with the Waxman and Markey Energy and Climate Bill, which has passed the House of Representatives. The bill, including a cap and trade system by 2016 and a 17-per cent cut of the US CO2 emissions by 2020, will now be an issue for the Senate to tackle. Even if the IMO is successful at the next conference, there is a risk that

»This means that maritime transport may have to pay twice for its greenhouse gas emissions« other regional and international bodies will impose rules, taxes and levies that will affect shipping.

The IMO approach is to introduce a toolbox including technical and operational features to reduce emissions and some sort of market-based instrument. This will mean costs for shipping. Add to this a possible tax or levy on bunker oils to raise money for investments in the Third World. This means that maritime transport may have to pay twice for its greenhouse gas emissions. This is however a tricky issue. An increased cost burden for maritime

“The role of the IMO is crucial and unavoidable but I am confident that the EU will give the IMO time to come up with a solution. It is essential that any measures are flag blind to avoid owners moving ships to other flags”, says Alfons Guinier, generalsecretary of ECSA, to Lloyd’s List.

transport with the ambition to finance development in poorer nations could prove counter-productive. A cost effective maritime transport sector is the backbone of globalization. If the costs for transporting goods at sea escalate, this could alter trade patterns. The labour cost advantage several developing countries have will be reduced if transport costs increase. This could lead to a move of production facilities from poor nations far away, to sites closer to the end markets in the richer parts of the world.

The MEPC meeting in March will have some really complex issues to tackle, and all delegates know that IMO has to produce the concrete measures needed to show the world that the shipping sector is prepared to take its part of the necessary greenhouse gas emission reductions.

38 Shipgaz No 1 2010

By Bent Mikkelsen bent@shipgaz.com

Report Friendlier propulsion

Photo: Bent Mikkelsen

Lady on display at COP15

The supply vessel Viking Lady – built to show the way to environmentally friendlier propulsion – drew the eyes of world leaders at COP15. The vessel was delivered in the spring of 2009 and is built to use Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) as the main fuel, but it is also the first full-scale experiment with fuel cell technology on board a ship. Fuel cells have been used for a number of years ashore, but the plant of the Viking Lady is the first to be tested in the often harsh environment of the North Atlantic.

The combination of LNG and fuel cell propulsion (with normal marine diesel as back-up) gives the Viking Lady an environmental performance second to none amongst sailing ves-

sels. That is why Eidesvik Offshore ASA and Wärtsilä took the Viking Lady to Copenhagen during the COP15 summit in order to display the results to world leaders. One of the events on the ship was that the COP15 Mayors’ summit were invited to sail on the Viking Lady on a tour outside the port of Copenhagen to view a wind-power plant in Øresund. “We have years of experience with gas as fuel on supply ships”, explains Jan Fredrik Meling, CEO of Eidesvik

»We were thrilled to be a part of the future«

Jan Fredrik Meling, CEO of Eidesvik Offshore.

Offshore ASA. “So when we were approached by Wärtsilä and DNV in order to test a fuel cell plant on board we were thrilled to be a part of the future.” The Viking Lady is fitted with a plant with an output of 385 kW as the maximum during the test period. But the plant is really a 1,000-kW plant, which in itself was capable of producing enough power to run the ship under normal circumstances.

“That means that the fuel cell plant could run the ship entirely and minimize the fuel consumption dramatically”, explains Kjell Sandaker, engineer

Viking Lady Port of Registry . .............................. Haugesund Call sign . ..................................................... LAWZ Class .................. DNV 1A1, Ice C, Fire Fighter 1, OILREC, SF, LFL, Comf-V (3), E0, Dynpos, Autr. Naut-OSV(A), Clean Design DK (+), HL Hull .......... Torlak Denizcilik Sanayi, Tuzla #30 Fitting out .... West Contractors, Ølensvåg #30

Delivered ..................................... April 29, 2009 Length o a .................................................. 92.2 m Length b p .................................................. 84.8 m Breadth ....................................................... 20.4 m Draught ......................................................... 7.6 m GT . ........................................................... 6,111 tons NT .......................................................... 1,834 tons

DWT .................................................... 6,200 tons Cabins for 25 passengers Machinery Wärtsilä 4 x type 6R32DF Output: 9,840 kW 2 x Rolls Royce Azimuth thrusters AZP 100 FP

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 39

Friendlier propulsion

Report Photo: Bent Mikkelsen

»The fuel cell plant could run the ship entirely and minimize fuel consumption dramatically« at Eidesvik and project developer at the FellowSHIP project, the result of which is the Viking Lady (see fact box). “The fuel cell plant is placed on the cargo deck in a secure steel box, which, if something should go wrong in the chemical process, explodes the aft end of the vessel and goes directly into the sea instead of generating pressure towards the accommodation”, says Kjell Sandaker.

The propulsion plant on the Viking Lady consists of electrical propellers powered by either the normal engine plant, incorporating two Wärtsilä units type 6R32DF, or the fuel cell. “The reverse design on the supply ship (one of four in the Eidesvik fleet) gives a much better ship for its purpose”, says Kjell Sandaker. “There are several advantages with this design and only a few disadvantages. The main advantage is that only one control station is needed on the bridge. Not a forward control and an aft control and the risk of failure during the switch. Another advantage is the azimuth propellers, which work in the water several metres below the ship’s hull. This gives a better environment for the crew in the accommodation as regards noise. Also the traditional noise from the bow thruster has been moved 90 metres to the bow of the vessel, far away from the crew quarters. In fact, the only disadvantage is that the ship’s fuel tanks, when us-

Kjell Sandaker, engineer at Eidesvik and FellowSHIP project developer. ing LNG, need a safer space on board. This space is deducted from the space for liquid mud and other cargo normally carried in tanks below deck”, says Kjell Sandaker.

The Viking Lady was delivered from Ølensvåg for a long-term time charter for the French oil major Total, running supplies from the offshore base Husavik in the Stavanger area to the Hild field in the western area of the Norwegian sector. It is a voyage of 18–20 hours each way. “We take bunkers once a week under normal circumstances. It’s delivered in Husavik by a tanker truck that rolls up on the quayside”, explains the Viking Lady’s Chief Engineer Kjell Ivar Myre. “Using LNG is not a problem in the ports of western Norway, says Jan Fre-

Fuel cell In short, a fuel cell is an electro chemical energy conversion device. A fuel cell converts hydrogen and oxygen into water, and in the process it produces electricity. The process is very similar to that of a normal battery.

drik Meling, but so far it’s not something you can get in Aberdeen, which is one of the central ports for offshore vessels. But I’m sure that oil suppliers will take up that challenge within a short time if we and other operators come with ships using LNG as fuel”, says Jan Fredrik Meling.

“The engine plant is a little more complicated than a normal engine plant and every one on board in the engine department has been on special gas courses in order to handle the different kind of fuel, but otherwise there is no problem in using LNG as fuel”, says Kjell Ivar Myre. “There is more restricted use of tools in the engine rooms (two rooms each with two engines) because of the risk of gas in the room, as well as a more extensive detection system.”

FellowSHIP – four joined forces for the future The Viking Lady is the result of four parties putting their efforts together to develop a more environmental friendly ship for the future and contribute to reduce CO2 and NOx emissions. It was done under the umbrella called FellowSHIP with participation from Det Norske Veritas (DNV), Eidesvik Offshore ASA, Wärtsilä and MTU Onsite Energy.

Eidesvik Offshore ASA already had a lot of experience with gas fuelled supply vessels and wanted to take that further.

has been very courageous in creating the ship of the future and we have made the class approval of the complete fuel cell system on board the Viking Lady.”

“It has been a very interesting research and development work coordinating the different technologies”, said Tor Svensen, COO DNV Maritime, at the presentation of Viking Lady in Copenhagen. “Eidesvik Offshore

Eidesvik’s first gas fuelled ship was the Viking Energy, delivered in 2003 followed by the Viking Queen in 2007 and the Viking Lady in 2009, which is the third supply vessel built to this

special design with the accommodation house aft. The German partner MTU Onsite Energy is Europe’s leading developer of fuel cell technology and is the provider of the so-called HotModule on board the Viking Lady. This particular maritime HotModule is the world’s first high temperature fuel cell on board an offshore vessel.

40 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Report EU ports sulphur directive

By Fredrik Davidsson fredrik@shipgaz.com

Photo: fredrik davidsson

Auxiliary engines, like this one on board the Tarnbris, must be run on fuel with a maximum of 0.10 per cent sulphur while in EU ports.

New rules concern all vessels

As of January 1, 2010 all vessels in European Union ports must burn fuel with no more than 0.1 per cent sulphur. The new rules have raised questions. The new rules have been known for years but they still raise questions as to when, where and who they would apply to. Not to mention if it is at all possible to make the switch to the low sulphur fuel. To start with, the new rules does not apply to all vessels with in a port, only to ships at berth and “ships at berth means ships which are securely moored or anchored in a Community port while they are loading, unloading or hotelling, including the time spent when not engaged in cargo operations”, the EU directive states. This means that as soon a vessel is moving the 0.1 limit – which is to be read as 0.10 – does not apply.

But as there have been complaints from shipowners that the switch over from heavy fuel oil to the low sulphur fuel is not always a simple and quick procedure the commission gives room for the switch by “allowing sufficient time for the crew to complete any necessary fuel-changeover operation as soon as possible after arrival at berth

and as late as possible before departure. Member States shall require the time of any fuel-changeover operation to be recorded in ships’ logbooks.” It is also the member state’s obligation not to allow that any marine gas oil with a sulphur content exceeding 0.1 per cent by mass is placed on the market.

»Ships at berth means ships which are securely moored or anchored« The 0.1 limit does not apply to vessels on a published timetable due to be at berth for less than two hours, to ships that switch off all engines and use shore-side electricity while at berth in ports or until January 1, 2012 for the vessels listed in the Annex and operating exclusively within the territory of the Hellenic Republic.

The Commission has been very clear stating there are no exceptions and no one can say they did not have any chance to bunker the 0.1 per cent fuel, even though it is basically only available in the EU, or that they did not have time to make the necessary changes in the engine department. The new rules apply to everyone, has been the Commission’s line. But since this hard line was heavily criticized the Commission issued recommendations to the member states that was interpreted as giving some

room for leniency towards shipowners who could present plans for an imminent retrofit to make the fuel switch possible. However the Swedish government agency, for example, quickly stated that this recommendation does not change the fact that “As the regulation is part of the Swedish Environmental Code the Swedish Transport Agency’s personnel are obligated to report any suspected violation to public prosecution.” This confirms one of the shipowners’ worst fears, the new rules will be enforced differently throughout the EU.

Another tricky qestion is what constitutes a port. The Commission does not have an answer but leans on a paragraph in UNCLOS, but at the same time says this paragraph does not apply, instead “the delimitations (area) of the port is established by the Competent Authority in each single Member State and not by the Directive, any further consultation should be done with the respective authorities.”

Repair, Maintenance, Conversion. Maintenance and regular dry docking of M/T Ramona, a 16000 tonnes Chemical Tanker owned by Rederi AB ร lvtank. One of many dockings made by our clients on a regular basis.

Gรถtaverken Cityvarvet is a modern and accessible shipyard that offers great flexibility for rapidly shifting needs. With four quays and two docks, the biggest measuring 268 x 35 meters, we can handle all types of ships. Visit our new website: www.cityvarvet.se Gรถtaverken is a a member of the

Shipyards Group.

The daily details of a

site team “Gothenburg based Stena RoRo is building the world’s largest ropax vessels at Nordic Yards in Wismar, Germany. The site team is the company’s people in place to make sure that what is paid for is also delivered. Most of their daily work revolves around a rather inconspicuous white book. TEXT & PHOTO: FREDRIK DAVIDSSON

Stena RoRo is building the world’s two largest ropaxvessels at Nordic Yards in Germany. The site team are those that make sure what is paid for is also delivered. ven though it has been twenty years since the iron curtain fell, Wismar in eastern Germany still has a touch of the old DDR. Many houses in the old city centre have been restored, the town square is more than picturesque, but there is still a whole lot of renovation to do. Even the odd Trabant can be seen in the streets. Churches dominate Wismar’s skyline but if you turn your eyes north, towards the Wismarbucht and the Baltic Sea, the harbour cranes and the huge hall of Nordic Yards will immediately catch your eye, so does the fact that the sign on the hall still says Aker Yards. The red and white funnel of the Stena newbuilding already at the outfitting quay is hard to miss as well.

The ten chosen men on the Stena RoRo site team are working out of an old building right next to the outfitting quay and even though they inhabit the top floor, three flights of stairs, at a peculiar angle which makes the climb up a little awkward, the team members are close to their newbuildings. “Yes, I would say the members of the team are hand picked. These are not jobs you apply for”, says Per Elffors, Technical Operations Manager at Stena RoRo. In the team there are specialists on paint, steel, machinery, electrical installations, nautical department and accommodation. “There’s one reason we are here, and one reason only; there’s a thick white book, the spec, that we paid a whole lot of money for and we are here to make sure we get what that book says we are supposed to get. That’s our mission, end of story”, says site manger Bo Christensen.

The team members are on site at the shipyard to make sure that Stena RoRo get what they pay for. They walk the huge hall where the hulls are assembled, the paint shops, all the floors, tanks and every possible space of the vessel already at the outfitting quay on their daily inspections. Some are announced and called for by the shipyard, others are unannounced. As the team members are the buyer’s eyes and hands on site, the buyer Stena RoRo is of course very keen to know the members really are people with the right motivation. Stena RoRo is a part of the Stena Sphere. The company is specialised in design and conversion of vessels that are chartered out to operators within and outside the Stena Sphere. The current fleet consists of a dozen vessels, including four newbuildings under construction. In addition to the ropax pair being built in Wismar, Stena RoRo has two ropax vessels on order from Samsung in South Korea for deliveries during 2011.

Anders Efraimsson and Ingvar Svanberg both have been working with newbuildings for Stena since the middle of the 1990s.

Filip Arnerius and Emil Brantmark agree it is a great way to develop and learn new things to get the chance to work with a newbuilding.

The specification is the centre of attention for the Stena RoRo site team and their work at the Nordic Yards facility in Wismar.

“All that red and white on the funnel is just a sticker, not paint”, says Emil Brantmark. The large round windows make the cabins light and give passengers and crew a close contact with the sea.

“An almost endless stream of workers pour onto the vessel at the outfitting quay after lunch. Like at most shipyards nowadays the work force consists of both the yard’s own employees as well as workers from numerous sub-contractors. Even though Wismar is considered a fairly small yard, a bicycle is still the way to get around.

The vessel is more narrow from about half way up from the water line, a necessity to handle the stability with only 6.4 metres below water.

The first of the two Stena vessels is due for delivery this spring. Beyond the out fitting quay, in Wismarâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s harbour, vessels are loaded with scrap metal.

Staffan Stenfelt and Bo Christensen are working closely together and they seem to get along really well, the newbuilding manager and the site manager.

»These vessels are very special with their shallow draft, only 6.40 metres, which they have specifically for the Hoek van Holland to Harwich run« “Those who sign up for a project like this are people who want something new in their career”, says Per Elffors, who became a chief engineer when he was 30 and then chose to find new challenges in the shore-based organisation. Filip Arnerius, responsible for machinery and ventilation, is one of those people and his reason to accept the offer to join the site team is very much the same as what Per Elffors felt 30 years earlier: “As a chief I have said to myself ‘I am 38 years old, am I going to do this for another 30 years?’ It is quite natural, when you have been sailing for 10 or 15 years that you want to see something different. You do not really learn anything new, when you have seen a number of vessels as a chief.”

The vessels under construction at Nordic Yards are going to be the world’s largest ropax-vessels, 240 metres long with 5,500 lane-metres and capacity for 1,200 passengers. The vessels are built by Stena RoRo but they will be operated by Stena Line on the North Sea on the Hoek van Holland to Harwich run. When the news on the newbuildings contracts was first heard, Stena did not want to talk about where they were going to trade, the North Sea or the Baltic Sea. For Stena RoRo, who was to build the vessels, the picture was always a little clearer. “To us the vessels trading area was always clear”, says Staffan Stenfelt, Newbuilding Manager at Stena RoRo and the man who the site team in Wismar report back to in Gothenburg and who, as the newbuilding manager, is really the one responsible for

what is in the all important white book, the specification. “These vessels are very special with their shallow draft, only 6.40 metres, which they have specifically for the Hoek van Holland to Harwich run”, says Bo Christensen, site manager in Wismar, his first job as a site manager. “I have been in this project from the beginning, more or less. I was not supposed to become site manager but then all of a sudden Staffan had me backed into a corner and I could not say no”, Bo Christensen says with a broad smile. “I regularly visit our vessels for inspections and that is when I find people worth keeping an eye on. I have watched Bo Christensen for 15 years, even though he has not been with Stena all the time. Now he has advanced quite quickly, from being the inspector responsible for machinery at newbuildings we had at Fosen in Norway, to become the site manager in Wismar with full responsibility”, says Per Elffors.

Being a member of a site team is a change in your career if you work at sea, a chance to see how the vessels you are used to operating are built. But it also means long work days, often at a site far from home. Wismar in northern Europe is very close to home for most of the site team members of this particular team, since most of them live in Sweden. Korea would be a completely different thing. “I have been working on site teams in Spain, Italy, Croatia and Poland on various Stena newbuildings and I had actually quit doing this and gone back to sailing but when this turned up and it was close to home I took the job. I can go home most weekends, so a normal family life can work out”, says Anders Efraimsson, the inspector responsible for the electrical installations. Had the job been in the Far East the situation would have been different, site teams on such locations do not have the same possibilities to go home. A trip home every six months is more likely. “My family would have said no, if I was to start talking about

The huge assembly hall makes the men coming out of it look like ants streaming out of their anthill.

â&#x20AC;&#x2C6;All sections are built up side down and not turned on their right keel until they are welded onto the hull, like this section where the rudders will be fitted later on.

â&#x20AC;&#x2C6;Emil Brantmark takes a look at the machinery, already installed in what is to become the engine room once it is covered by the next sections of the hull.

Shipgaz Training. Competence development for seafarers.

With our web application Shipgaz Training we provide computer based education for your employees. Custom-made courses for your companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s speciďŹ c needs let you meet the increasing demands for competence development. Shipgaz Training offers a cost efficient service for ship owners and a time saving tool for the operative personnel. A service from Shipgaz.

www.shipgaz.com/training

“A ropax-vessel is perhaps the most difficult type of vessel to build because there are completely different sets of rules and regulations depending on what deck we are talking about; passenger vessel and cargo vessel”, says Emil Brantmark.

a job in Asia. But this job is great fun, especially since I have done it before and I get to see all the guys again. We all know each other in this business”, says Anders Efraimsson. This camaraderie and good work relations can be seen and heard in both the team jargon and the comfortably cluttered desks filled with blueprints and papers. The walls are covered with even more blueprints and general arrangements of the vessels growing in the dock and being outfitted just metres away outside the old office building.

“We are a really good team, we complement each other very well”, says Anders Efraimsson. “Even though we all have our own separate responsibilities, we can always help each other out. For example it would have to be something very specific, if I was not able to help with an inspection on a paint job”, says Filip Arnerius, 38, who is happy with his job on the site. “You learn so many things all the time on this job and get a better understanding of things you have to work with every day as a chief or engineer.” Though he quit his former job as a chief engineer, and at least in theory will have no job once the second vessel is delivered in the fall, Filip Arnerius has decided not to worry about this, yet. “I am sure there is a chief job for me somewhere if necessary.”

Anders Efraimsson still has his job as an electrician on board one of Stena Line’s vessels and he has been back and forth between site teams and work on board before and he knows the feeling when the newbuilding leaves the shipyard. “There can be little things we have discussed and worked with for months that now do not matter anymore; to the crew it is not an issue, it is a little like flipping the light switch when the vessel is finished and leaves the yard.”

The team members all live in Wismar, in apartments close to the picturesque square, and contrary to what you might believe they are not all bachelors. They all have wives and families. Filip Arnerius even moved his wife and two children to Germany. “We had the opportunity as we had our second child and my wife could take her maternity leave, so we decided to move down here, and it is working out fine. OK, some things might seem a little ‘East German’ but day care and medical services have been great. If you want to you can be annoyed by a lot of things that are not like back home in Sweden, but then you can be annoyed by why the parking signs don’t look like what you are used to, and what’s the use in that.”

Even though taxes in Germany are favourable compared to Sweden, money is not reason enough to choose a job on a site team, not if you are leaving a job as chief engineer. “The salary is about the same as I had as a chief. If I wanted to have a job just for the money I would go back and find work in Norway, I have worked there before and the money is double up there.” Emil Brantmark, the team’s nautical expert, shares this opinion and he has his mind clear as to why you want to make the career step and start working on newbuilding sites. “You don’t take this job because of the pay or because you get to go home every weekend – we are just lucky we are in Germany – but because it is a chance to really learn. All of us here are people who do not want just routine, do your watch and that’s it. We want challenges”, says Emil Brantmark. “It is interesting all the time”, Filip Arnerius fills in and Anders Efraimsson who just came back into Next the office perhaps pins down the most important Site manager point: Bo Christensen “It is really great fun, otherwise we would not have done it.”

19,000 tons of steel are cut and handled before the vessel is finsihed, by then consisting of 14,500 tons of steel.

“My job is mostly to try to solve different kinds of problems. I spend a lot of time talking to the other members”, says Bo Christensen, first time site manager but with long experience from ships and shipyards. he site manager is responsible on site; he handles his team, writes reports to the home office and of course has overall responsibility for the project at hand. “The specification, I think I know it almost word for word because that is what our job is all about. Getting what the specification says we should get. But my job as site manager is really about being a leader, there are a lot of staff issues, I want them to talk to me. We can solve things together.” Even though he is the manager of the team, Bo Christensen is not the oldest man around, nor is he the only one with long experience from newbuilding projects. He must watch his step sometimes. “I must not step on anyone’s toes, many of these guys are strong personalities with strong opinions. It is all too easy for prestige to enter the picture, and that can be something dangerous.” Bo Christensen does not handle too many inspections himself. Most of the inspections that need to be signed by Stena

RoRo are handled by the other team members. This does not mean the site manager sits in his office or in meetings all the time. “No, that would be fatal. The ship must never become something that just happens ‘over there’. One of our team members has a good expression: patrolling he calls it”, says Bo Christensen and explains what he means. “You must walk around the ship all the time to see what is going on. If you see something that does not look right you stop and look at it for a while the first day, the next day when you pass by the same spot you can be almost sure whatever was wrong has been corrected. Somebody saw you standing there and knew trouble was coming and fixed the problem.” But of course as the manager, sometimes there is only you left to take the responsibility that comes with the position. “The large and important inspections I will always attend of course. Like when we had the final inspection of the bottom before we took the first vessel out of the dry dock. Obviously our

“Perhaps I’m just a control freak but I don’t think you can have a substitute on a job like this. You are involved in so many things at the same time. I don’t see how you could catch up if you spent one month at home and then came back for one month.” Staffan Stenfelt and Bo Christenssen take a tour of the vessel to see if the yard is delivering as agreed.

paint man does not want to take full responsibility for it, the steel man doesn’t either and the man responsible for the propellers of course doesn’t want to take full responsibility. Then it falls on my desk, it is my job.” “I couldn’t agree more, it is not going to be a good ship if our team doesn’t spend time on the ship”, says Staffan Stenfelt, Newbuilding Manager at Stena RoRo, who himself works in Wismar two weeks a month, attend meetings, talk to his site team and not least puts on his hard hat and walks the ship himself.

Bo Christensen started his career as an engine apprentice in 1980, but this was a time when Swedish shipping companies went out of business and he had to find other work. “I stuck with ships and shipyards all the time, I travelled and installed propeller shafts and worked with diesel engines. In 1990 I went back to sea and in 1994 I began at the Maritime Academy. It wasn’t until 2001 I took my last exam and in 2003 I got my certificate as chief engineer” Only a few years later he got the chance to join the site team in Fosen, where Stena RoRo was building two roro-vessels, the Stena Traveller and the Stena Trader. “Your background with repair works is really very good”, says Staffan Stenfelt who himself comes from a background with both the classification society DNV and the Swedish Maritime Administration. There is a clear distinction in responsibilities between the

site manager and the newbuilding manager when it comes to what can be decided on site, without asking Gothenburg. “We have a really good thing going there, as long as it is about technical stuff my hands are quite free, but as soon as it has an impact on the vessels capacity our economic consequences in excess of the project budget I call Staffan”, says Bo Christensen. “Yes, that’s very good. Everything that has to do with the vessel’s speed, lane-metres, money or dead weight, I am the only one who can make a decision. They are never supposed to have to feel the pressure from those kinds of questions down here on site, they are supposed to be free and able to talk to the shipyard without that kind of restrictions” says Staffan Stenfelt.

At the end of two days of project meetings concerning little things like recessions in a wall, where a TV set is supposed to fit that has become too shallow as the size of the desired TV has increased since the specification was written, to big things like the all-important cargo space, Staffan Stenfelt and Bo Christensen make a tour of the vessel at the outfitting quay to see, if they are still getting what they Next pay for. Inspections ... “Cargo capacity and passenger accommodation that’s what it is all about from the very beginning of the project”, says Staffan Stenfelt.

In the middle of what to the unacustomed may look like confusion and too many chefs making a soup, Anders Efraimsson is calm and in control of the situation.

Tuesday morning in December is chilly, but the engine control room is crowded and warm as the final inspection of the bilge water system is about to begin. tena RoRoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s site team is there, Lloydsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Registers man on site is there, as well as two men from the Swedish Maritime Administration. Not to mention all the project people from the shipyard. Out of the thousands of controls that need to be performed, checked and signed by the Stena RoRo people, the bilge water system contains only a fraction. This morning the yard will prove that what the computer says in the control room actually happens in the vessel. When an alarm point is set off it must be checked that it is the right alarm point. If it says it is one of the aft bilge wells that has been flooded it had better be that one and not another one at the other end of the boat. When the

system says the bilge pump is running it had better be running. This too must be checked. The bilge wells have been flooded and now it will be demonstrated that they can be cleared from water. Anders Efraimsson is at the control board watching all the alarms. There is a bit of controversy as to how to monitor all bilge wells and the pump at the same time. Filip Arnerius heads out to check the wells and Marcus Karjalainen heads for the pump room where he makes sure the single bilge pump is running and that pressures are stable, there are no leaks. Apparently the system is working as Filip Arnerius reports back that water levels in the flooded wells are pumped out when the system says they are, and the pump

is running fine. In the control room there is confusion but Anders Efraimsson is cool. “I am feeling very confident and secure, I checked all the triggers before. I can check this one off.”

In the middle of everything Marcus Karjalainen takes off

them. He writes a remark in the record before he signs it. “The explanation for the reversed order of the manoeuvring panels is very simple, you can’t have the panel under the deck you are manoeuvring because then you would be crushed. So you have the number four panel under number deck five, I knew that, really”, says Marcus Karjalainen when the inspection is over.

to perform an inspection of the hydraulic system for the hoistable decks. It should have been done yesterday but had to be re-scheduled. Marcus Karjalainen takes out his flash light and shines it along all the stainless steel pipes of the hydraulic system, pulls them here and there and seems to think it is all OK. But then he looks like as if there is something wrong. “I don’t know why the manoeuvre panel for deck number five comes before number four. I will have to ask for an explanation.” The inspection of the hydraulic system takes 20 minutes and Marcus Karjalainen brings the workers who installed the system to a spot where he pulls the pipes. They bend easily and he asks the workers to put one more fastening point on

The whole test and inspection of the bilge system takes the better part of the morning but the Stena RoRo people all agree it went well, only a minor remark. “This is a shipyard where the workers are really proud of their work and they don’t want to leave any bad jobs behind”, says Anders Efraimsson with his experience from a number of shipyards and Filip Arnerius agrees. Next “Yes, when the shipyard calls us to an inspection The troubles at they are usually well prepared. They know the sysNordic Yards tem, or whatever it is that is to be inspected, works. They don’t take any chances.”

Marcus Karjalainen shines his flash light along all the stainless steel pipes of the hydraulic system for the hoistable decks.

â&#x20AC;&#x2C6;Marcus Karjalainen asks for some explanations from the team resposible for the hydraulic installations before he is ready to check off the inspection he has just carried out.

â&#x20AC;&#x2C6;Happy with the answers he gets and with what he has seen with his own eyes during the inspection, Marcus Karjalainen makes only a small small remark about an extra fixing point before he puts his signature on yet another inspection report.

Both Lloyd’s Registers’ P A Eliasson and Stena RoRo’s Marcus Karjalainen are happy with how the bilge water pump is running.

â&#x20AC;&#x2C6;Peculiar sculpture on a Wismar bridge. The narrow streets in the old town of Wismar are more than picturesqe. The city suffered heavy bombings during the second World War and old buildings had to be re-built. Wismar was part of Sweden until 1803 when it was pledged to Mecklenburg with the possibility for Sweden to change its mind 100 years later.

â&#x20AC;&#x2C6;Even though Wismar is much like any modern town there are still reminders it is located in what used to be the DDR. Like this Trabant still rolling the city streets, but the old car is not the reason why Wismar is on the UNESCO list of World Heritage sites.

In 2006 when Stena RoRo ordered their ropax-vessels from what was then called Aker Yards Germany everything was looking bright. Newbuilding orders were climbing towards record levels and German yards were pumping out container vessels. Since then a lot has happened. n June 5, 2009, it was a Friday, the yard filed for insolvency”, says Lars Back, the yard’s project manager for Ropax 55, the Stena vessels. The Swede Lars Back has been the project manager for the Stena vessels since the start in 2006, but his history with the shipyard in Wismar goes back almost ten years and he has seen a number of changes in the owner structure from the time when it was owned by Aker through the merger with Kvaerner’s yard in Warnemünde and into the Russian ownership in Wadan yards, which went into insolvency in the summer of 2009 and then re-emerged in the autumn with a new Russian owner. “Our new Russian owner is normally here in Wismar at least three days a week, the old owner we hardly ever saw. Mr Yusufov is trying to strengthen our organisation and he is trying to bring home new contracts. If it takes a fortnight or two months before we see any signed contracts is very hard to tell.” In the autumn of 2009 the new ownership said Nordic Yards would diversify by focusing on larger offshore constructions at the yard in Warnemünde and in Wismar the focus would be on not as large but more specialized tonnage. “These were plans drawn up by the management already long before the new ownership was in place, it is quite natural as the site in Warnemünde is larger, while we here in Wismar are restricted in size by our assembly dock and its hall.”

The Wismar yard is not as bustling as it used to be. Last spring 2,300 people worked with the shipbuilding, all of them were sent home during the insolvency and since then only about 1,000 of them have been re-employed. The last plates for the ropax-vessels have been cut and the steel cutting hall with its hundreds of metres of conveyers and cutting machines is virtually empty and silent. Only some welding on the very last few sections for the second Stena vessel is going on at the moment. Behind those sections there should have been a continuous flow of sections for the next project, but there is no next project.

Project manager Lars Back still has the old yard name on his hard hat.

The container pair that broke the Wismar yardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s back when the intended buyer could not finance his purchase.

The dry dock inside the assembly hall can be divided in sections and partially flooded.

“In 2005, 2006 and 2007 we built 14 to 17 container vessels annually. The yard was streamlined for this production, with several vessels under construction in the dock at the same time.” By now we all know that if there is one segment of shipping, where the market will be flooded with new vessels, it is the container segment. Alongside, just in front of the first Stena newbuilding, lie two brand new black and white container vessels. In a way they were the straw that broke the camel’s back and forced Wadan Yards to file for insolvency. “They were finished and ready to be delivered before the insolvency but they were not paid for. Now they are sold and delivered to their new owner and not ours any more, but they are still lying here waiting for a change in the market, I suppose. In Warnemünde we have another two container vessels under construction”, says Lars Back.

During the three to four months of standstill that was brought about by the insolvency, many subcontractors and suppliers lost money, on goods already delivered but not paid for and on orders not being delivered rather than delivered with bleak expectations of receiving any money in return. “We have virtually no companies supplying equipment directly to us, they all have their contracts with the yard”, says Staffan Stenfelt, Newbuilding Manager at Stena RoRo. There are still Swedish suppliers to the German yard who claim not to have received any payment for goods delivered, they even claim not to have heard a word from the yard since before the insolvency. A situation Lars Back does not recognize. “Yes, it is true, many companies lost money, some of them a lot, but we now have re-negotiated all contracts and we have not had a single supplier who has chosen to pull

»Yes, it is true, many companies lost money, some of them a lot, but we now have re-negotiated all contracts and we have not had a single supplier who has chosen to pull out of the project« out of the project. They all want to be part of this particular project.” According to Lars Back, 70 per cent of all subcontractors and suppliers in the project are German and have a better understanding of how German laws work and what happens during an insolvency process in Germany. “Some negotiations have been tough, others have been easier. Generally the negotiations with German companies have been easier because of their better understanding of the process. Stena has been very professional in this and referred all suppliers to us.” Whether Lars Back believes in the future of the shipyard in Wismar is hard to tell, but it is obvious that he likes to give the grand tour of the yard and point out all its strengths and he certainly believes in the project he is managing.

The last sections are going through the paint shop before the assembly is started at the side of the large covered dock before they are moved down into the dock, where they are turned on their right keel, all sections are constructed upside down, and fitted to the hull already very much looking like a proper vessel. “Each vessel consists of more then 50 sections and the finished vessel consists of 14,500 tons of steel, but to get there we have worked with, and cut, 19,000 tons.”

* POSTAGE NOT INCLUDED

Subscribe for only €80 a year * Price EUR 7 No 3 – April 24, 2009 www.shipgaz.com

Price EUR 7 No 4 – June 5, 2009 www.shipgaz.com

Price EUR 7 No 2 – March 13, 2009 www.shipgaz.com

Price EUR 7 No 1 – January 30, 2009 www.shipgaz.com

Price EUR 7 No 5 – September 4, 2009 www.shipgaz.com

Brand new magazine

Shipgaz visits the Orasund alongside:

Fixing up a Dane The front page picture is sponsored by Berg Propulsion AB

Anchor handling on the North Sea:

Waiting for a weather window Officer labour market untouched

Grimaldi – an A ragged beauty Italian conqueror An ST Army Tug with the

Despite alarming headlines on lay-offs and lay-ups, ship officers in the Nordic countries keep their employments, according to a Shipgaz survey. page 50

Despite the strong traditions of the family, Dr Emanuele Grimaldi has never taken his position in the Group for granted. page 20

Special:

paint falling off in flakes caught the eye of Bengt Fredriksson. Now he is determined to make her better than new. page 78

Shipgaz signs on to Immingham:

Onboard insight »Although Shipgaz Long way back is a new magazine, In March 2007, the tug Bohus was smashed to it stands on solid splinters on the rocks off ground with a more Härmanö. Captain Ole than centuryKristiansen tells his story long heritage« of his way back to work EDITORIAL, PAGE 4

after the trauma. PAGE 22

In the land of the polar bear The engine department – a poor workplace?

Too many sea engineers crawl and squeeze their way through work. Monica Lundh at Chalmers checks out why. PAGE 16

Always leave the ship together as a group. Never go ashore without a weapon. Cruising at Svalbard offers astonishing nature and animal life, but you need to move with care. PAGE 27

Custom-made for The adventures the Western Channel of seaman Pålle

Yearbook of Maritime Technology

Built in Bangladesh

Struggling for a sick sea

“It was a long and tedious journey. But it was worth it”, says Jan Fabricius, pioneering by building the Stella Maris in Bangladesh. PAGE 18

Anne Christine Brusendorff of HELCOM thinks that the Baltic Sea still has a future, but only if we act now. PAGE 14

Brittany Ferries introduces the ro-pax Armorique, their largest ever purpose built vessel for the Plymouth–Roscoff service. PAGE 36

A day on the Hansa route Shipgaz signed on the Finnstar in Helsinki and followed captain Jukka Tapiovaara and his crew to Travemünde. page 24

Hushed up grounding Survival technique An anonymous e-mail to the for female seafarers shipowner’s head office revealed that one of their bulkers had been grounded – but sailed on with damages to the hull. The crew had said nothing. page 20

Negotiator, constructor, maintainer or reproducer – which one are you? PhD student Momoko Kitada has identified four strategic roles for women on board. page 16

Shipgaz is a modern shipping magazine for operative personell. Every issue contains current events, newbuildings, onboard stories, technical innovations, safety related information, in-depth features and much more, crucial information as well as entertainment. A weekly e-mailed newsletter is included in the subscription.

www.shipgaz.com/subscribe

The story of Nils-Arne Pålsson begins on the steamer Moldavia in 1950 and winds through rat wars and cholera to his electronic inventions for the maritime industry. PAGE 58

Set on ﬁnding the right stuﬀ In the brown leather chairs of Maritime Psychologist Bengt Schager’s office, the sheep are divided from the goats. PAGE 44

74 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Report African bunker operation

By Bent Mikkelsen bent@shipgaz.com

Photo: bent mikkelsen

Tärntank’s the Tarnsjo and the Tarnfors have been through a threeweek upgrading stay at Fredericia Shipyard in order to customize them for a Stena Oil charter off West Africa.

Next stop Abidjan

Stena Oil and Tärntank venture into African waters with two tankers rebuilt into bunker vessels. We visited the ships lying alongside in Fredericia. On the first day of 2010, the two Tärntank units, the Tarnsjo and the Tarnfors from the company’s Norwegian-flagged fleet, took off from Brofjorden and Scandinavia, heading for African waters for a period of twelve months. There, the two vessels commenced a time charter for Stena Oil, which also started working in a new area: Bunkering off the West African coast.

“We are expanding into this particular area, strengthening our position as a world wide bunker supplier of quality products to the shipping industry”, says Patrik Pettersson, Executive Vice President of Stena Oil in a press release. The two tankers have been through a three-week upgrading stay at Fred-

ericia Shipyard in order to customize them for the bunker service. The ships have been fitted with several advanced hawser holes on the hull, as well as two deck cranes for handling hoses and the giant fender used when lying alongside another ship at sea. Also a whole new pipe system, connecting pumps and cargo with counters and drippers (for sampling of the oil delivered to a certain vessel), has been mounted on the deck. The work has been supervised by Ola Nilsson at Stena Oil. “My job is to guide the two vessels to be state-of-the-art bunker barges

»I am certain that everything will be ready in due course«

Fleet manager at Tärntank, Claes Möller.

for the work off the coast of Africa from the knowledge I have from all the other vessels that we employ at Stena Oil”, says Ola Nilsson. The conversion has been done in close cooperation with Tärntank Ship Management’s technical department headed by Managing Director Tryggve Möller.

“It has been a rather intensive operation”, says fleet manager Claes Möller. “There is always the limited time in combination with some wintery weather at Fredericia, but I am certain that everything will be ready in due course.” Shipgaz visited the Tarnsjo (ex Tarnsjö) while being rebuilt at Fre-

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 75

African bunker operation

Report Photo: bent mikkelsen

»It will be a lot warmer than trading in Northern European waters« dericia between Christmas and the New Year, when the ships were almost completed and ready for the new services. The Tarnsjo is manned with an eleven-man strong mainly Russian and Latvian crew under command of a Polish captain. “It makes no difference for us as part of the crew. Our wages and work periods will be almost the same during the stay in Africa. It will be a lot warmer than trading in Northern European waters, but otherwise it’s business as usual”, explains Konstantin Voronov, chief officer of the Tarnsjo.

Konstantin Voronov was born in Kaliningrad and still lives there. He has previous experience of sailing in tropical waters. His second officer is Mikhail Ivanyugin, who is a citizen of Murmansk in Northern Russia. “I have already sailed in tropical areas and I am not uncomfortable with it, but it will certainly be a change of climate for me”, says Mikhail Ivanyugin. “We had a couple of crew members, who rejected going to Africa. Especially a Chief Engineer on board took a major decision and asked for a transfer to one of the company’s other tankers trading regularly on Finland, because he would not be able to cope with the heat in the engine room in tropical waters”, explains Mikhail Ivanyugin.

The 25-year old second officer continues talking about his wife at home in their Murmansk flat and the fact that his wages in US dollars give them the financial opportunity to have his wife, who is a school teacher, staying at home to take care of their baby. “It is still a privilege to come with US dollars to Russia”, says Mikhail Ivanyugin. “So you can understand I am happy for the assignment at Tärntank, giving me a pay check around 50 per cent higher than my colleagues on a Russian ship.

The Tarnsjo’s Chief Officer Konstantin Voronov and 2nd Officer Mikhail Ivanyugin. “At the moment we are wondering how big workload we will get when we are working in West Africa”, says Konstantin Voronov. “Not that we are concerned or worried, but it is unfamiliar to us all and something completely different from the usual sailing from tanker terminal to tanker terminal in European waters. Also the fact that we will be on our own some 40 to 50 nautical miles off the coast in a part of the world where spare parts do not come as easily as in Scandinavia. But all crew members are ready to do their best in order to give the charterers the best possible performance”, says Konstantin Voronov. The Tarnsjo was built by Kværner Kleven’s Leirvik yard in 1993 and is on 10,970 DWT. The bunker service in West Africa is done along with the company sister the Tarnfors, which is a Shanghai-built unit of 8,245 DWT

»We expect Abidjan to be some kind of base port for the tankers as well as a filling station« stena oil Swedish Stena Oil is a supplier of marine fuel oils. It is part of the Stena Business Group.

from 1998. The Tarnfors is sailed by a crew of Filipinos.

The two sister ships left Swedish waters fully loaded with bunker oil for handing out in African waters in the range from Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire to Point Noire and Luanda in Angola. “Delivering bunkers to the Concordia managed VLCC’s trading from Angola to the USA could be part of the business in the area”, explains Ola Nilsson. “We expect Abidjan to be some kind of base port for the tankers as well as a filling station, unless we arrange for a larger tanker to work as a floating storage tanker in the area”, says Ola Nilsson.

76 Shipgaz No 1 2010

By Eddie Janson, eddie@shipgaz.com

Spotlight Safety

Bridge team without teamwork Safety: eddie Janson Captain Eddie Janson of MariTrain AB, instructor and consultant in maritime safety, points the Shipgaz spotlight at safety related matters.

master shall inform specifically that he assumes the responsibility. Why did the master have problems with receiving information from the officers and why did not the third officer want to challenge him?

The italian master was 66 years, n the previous issue of Shipgaz we could read about the grounding of the chemical tanker Maria M. According to the investigation report from the Swedish Transport Agency the main contributing factors were: that the master was not familiar with the bridge equipment, that he took over the conn on the bridge without clearly stating so, that the master had problems receiving information from the officers on board and that he acted in a way so the third officer did not want to challenge him. How can something like this happen to an experienced master with 45 years at sea? If we continue to look at these causes we can find the human factor behind all of them.

Why was the master not familiar with the bridge equipment? According to the ISM code “the company should ensure that the master is properly qualified for com-

»Hopefully the younger generation of captains will enforce a more team oriented management style.« OCIMF Vessel Inspection Questionnaires 3.6: Have senior deck officers attended bridge team management courses? TMSA 5.3.3: Vessel operators provide bridge resource management training courses for all deck officers.

mand”. In this case he was not. According to the report he mixed up the rudder indicator and the rate of turn indicator. He had been on board for two days. The vessel had a safety management certificate and their managers had a document of compliance, so there must have been a procedure for familiarization in place. We do not know if this procedure had been adhered to, but we can say for sure that the master was not familiar with the bridge equipment.

Why did the master take over the conn on the bridge without clearly stating so? According to the STCW code the

the Filipino third officer 38 years and this was his first contract as an officer in charge of a navigational watch. It is easy to understand that the third officer did not want to challenge the master. He was new as an officer and had respect for an experienced captain, a captain that according to the VDR had called someone “idiot” at at least two times during the approach. If the third officer’s respect was due to the master’s age and experience or caused by fear we do not know. The captain is in this case practising an old management style. Hopefully the younger generation of captains will enforce a more team oriented management style.

in addition, the cultural background of Filipinos and Italians has to be taken into account here as well. Both Filipinos and Southern Europeans usually have a “high power distance”, the definition of which is that the superior does not wish to delegate or share power but wish to distinPHoTo: JÖRGEN SPRÅNG

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 77

Safety

»All of the causes listed are proof of lack of bridge resource management« guish themselves as much as possible from those who have no power, while the subordinates have no initiative and need supervision. This high power distance creates a bridge team without teamwork but will result in a one man show. We do not wish to change anyone’s culture, but we want everyone to be aware of our cultural background so we can take it into account. The master is the team leader on the bridge and it is his responsibility to create a team spirit, taking into account all team members’ different abilities.

STCW Section A-VIII/2 23.3 The officer in charge of the navigational watch shall continue to be responsible for the safe navigation of the ship, despite the presence of the master on the bridge, until informed specifically that the master has assumed that responsibility and this is mutually understood.

Spotlight

INTERIOR INSULATION VENTILATION PIPING ELECTRICAL

All of the causes listed are proof of lack of bridge resource management although many officers today attend Bridge Resource Management (BRM) courses. BRM is a course that was originally developed from the airline industry’s Crew Resource Management (CRM). The work to convert the CRM training programme into BRM was carried out by Scandinavian Airlines Systems, The Swedish Club and six other major maritime organisations. Now that engineers are included in the target group for the training the name has changed to Marine Resource Management (MRM). The MRM course aims at creating good team leaders and team members by addressing issues related to leadership, management styles, culture, communication, automation, stress, fatigue etc. Bridge Team Management (BTM) normally has a totally different syllabus. Most BTM courses are based on the IMO model course 1.22 – Ship Simulator and Bridge Teamwork, which includes bridge procedures, ship handling and passage planning. It is very surprising that none of these courses are mandatory for officers in charge of a navigational watch. We know that the most common cause for accidents is the human factor, therefore it would be beneficial if both BRM/MRM and BTM were mandatory courses with refresher courses every five years.

ADRESS: BÄRINGE 1B, ANNEXET, SE-241 95 BILLINGE PHONE: +46 413-54 40 00 FAX: +46 413-54 41 10 E-MAIL: SCANMARINE@SCANMARINE.SE

78 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Editor Pär-Henrik Sjöström, par-henrik@shipgaz.com

Report Port Statistics

Photo: pär-henrik sjöström

The Port of Helsinki.

All Baltic Sea ports in one book

Traffic volumes for virtually all Baltic Sea ports have been collected within the same covers. The idea is to make Baltic Port List an annual yearbook. Collecting port statistics is not as easy as it first might seem. Project manager Johanna Särkijärvi at the Centre for Maritime Studies (CMS) of the University of Turku became aware of this quite soon when she joined the project in autumn 2008. “The trick is to obtain uniform statisticsb that are comparable and thus relevant for the user. The Internet is full of news about cargo development in the ports but you can never be sure what those figures really include. Comparable statistics make monitoring of the development possible”, she says.

Although Baltic Port List now was published for the third time, it was the second time Johanna Särkijärvi led the process.

The latest issue Baltic Port List 2008 is the most comprehensive of them so far. “We did not manage to receive statistics from a couple of small industrial wharves, but we certainly cover 99 per cent of the cargo handled in the region, which I am quite proud about”, Johanna Särkijärvi states. She says that there are no corresponding publications available, and that is also the reason for launching the project. “Complete port statistics for the whole Baltic Sea region has not been published before. The idea to make this publication has existed for a long time, but we had to arrange fi-

»We certainly cover 99 per cent of the cargo handled in the region«

Johanna Särkijärvi.

nancing before we could launch the project”, Johanna Särkijärvi explains. The Finnish Maritime Administration and University of Turku made it possible by partially financing the initial stage of the project. “To be able to publish the yearbook in a long term perspective, we have to get it running with its own sales revenues.”

According to Johanna Särkijärvi the release of the first edition was by far the most demanding. “It took quite a long time to publish the 2006 issue, as it was a pilot project. After the survey had been made of all the sources of information and the channels of information and communication had been localised and established, the collection

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 79

Port Statistics

Report Photo: pär-henrik sjöström

»It took quite a long time to publish the 2006 issue, as it was a pilot project« of data has been much easier”, she says. Surprisingly, it was actually the Swedish ports that caused most of the problems. The reason for that was by no means the lack of statistics in Sweden. “SIKA, the Swedish Institute for Transport and Communications Analysis, indeed collects complete port statistics, but due to the legislation they must not hand over any statistics about individual ports. This means that we have to collect all Swedish statistics directly from each port, which is a huge work and demands much checking of data. Processing and verifying the figures takes a considerable part of the total time needed for the project”, Johanna Särkijärvi informs.

Generally, she thinks that the data has been compiled in a relatively short time for this issue. “We began to collect statistics in mid May 2009 and the publication was released in the end of October. We have been able to refine the process a lot.” The main target group for the publication has been more difficult to define than expected. Initially Johanna Särkijärvi thought that it would naturally be port authorities and operators as well as shipping companies. Still those who have ordered the yearbook represent a much wider spectrum. “In addition to ports, the publication is used, for example, by authorities, consultants and freight forwarding companies. Our statistics have also frequently been used as a source in environmental research projects.” “A year ago it seemed that this publication was not very well known abroad. All persons in the Baltic Sea region, to whom I presented the book, were positively surprised by the fact that such a publication exists. We have now improved our marketing efforts for the 2008 edition and it has given results.” Still Johanna Särkijärvi thinks that only a small slice of the potential international market has been exploited.

Johanna Särkijärvi is project manager at the Centre for Maritime Studies (CMS) of the University of Turku, Finland. She joined the Baltic Port List project in autumn 2008. “However, it is positive that more and more companies are aware of the existence of this book. Our new customers have also been very pleased with the product.” The report contains a lot of data, such as cargo turnover and passenger statistics, and a variety of tables and charts. The development of the Baltic Sea ports is examined at three levels: port, state and the Baltic Sea. At the moment, no economic analysis is included in the report. Some observations Johanna Särkijärvi made while compiling the material. The recession is still not seen to any greater extent in the cargo volumes for 2008, as the development during the beginning of the year was very strong.

“In 2008 the overall cargo volume in the Baltic Sea was only slightly lower than in 2007. In general, the volume of exported goods

CMS The Centre for Maritime Studies (CMS) was founded in 1980 and became a special unit of the Turku University in 1984. CMS provides education, research and expert services in the maritime field.

decreased, while imports still increased.” In addition to Johanna Särkijärvi, the project employed two trainees. Also Antti Saurama, Head of Unit Research and Consulting services, participated with knowledge and support throughout the process.

Johanna Särkijärvi already looks forward to starting the work with Baltic Port List 2009. “I think we will start to collect data in April or May. Then the publication will be released in autumn 2010.” She is convinced that Baltic Port List 2009 will be even better than the latest issue. The intention is to widen the scope of trend analysis and bring new market perspectives for the readers. “I think there will be a lot of interesting information from the exceptional shipping year 2009”, Särkijärvi concludes.

80 Shipgaz No 1 2010

By Per Nyström, per@shipgaz.com

Spotlight Technology

Weld repair or welding damage Technology: Per Nyström Per Nyström has a long experience as Chief Engineer, Shipyard Superintendent and troubleshooter when propulsion systems fail. He is part owner of FT Engineering AB.

xperience has shown that extensive weld repair, after grounding, in way of the engine room may create more headache for the superintendent than the grounding damage itself. Weld repair will affect the entire structure of the hull, including engine foundations, consequently also the positions of engines and bearings. This is often ignored during the major repairs. Prior to dry-docking for repair, reference lines in the engine room are seldom established prior to major weld repair. The same goes for a suitable welding plan that is based on minimum deformation of the engine room during the repairs. It appears that the best qualifica-

tion for a welder in some repair yards often is to consume as many kilos of welding rods as possible in shortest possible time. This often leads to excessive deformations of the engine room double bottom, thus affecting machinery that require an alignment accuracy often better that 1/10 mm.

»It appears that the best qualiﬁcation for a welder in some repair yards is to consume as many kilos of welding rods as possible«

Case 1: A chemical tanker had hit ground just under the forward part of the engine room, and the repair

was done at a reputable Far East shipyard. Upon completion of the repairs and before departure, changes in the crankshaft deflection were found to have increased toward + in the aft crank of the engine crankshaft. For some reason, it was suspected that the intermediate shaft bearing had raised or that the stern tube had altered in position. Correction was concentrated to altering the shaft bearing or the stern tube position. This work was going on for ten days before it was obvious that the superintendent and chief engineer were on the wrong track. An independent service engineer was called in. Once the service engineer was on site, investigation showed that the engine during weld repair had been lifted 0.48 mm in the forward end, and thereby caused an increased reaction force in way of the intermediate bearing. Another two weeks had to be spent for realignment and re-chocking of the 650-ton heavy main engine. This Photo: PIerre ADoLFssoN

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 81

Technology

Photo: Per Nyström

material due to corrosion in the aft peak tank forward bulkhead. The bulkhead had to be repaired by renewal of steel between the two stern tubes. The aft peak tank was also a cooling water tank for the stern tubes. A welding plan was established, ending up with a welding time of two full working days in two shifts, and the plan was handed over to the yard in the evening. The next morning the welding was completed. The result was that the PS stern tube had moved 1.19 mm toward the centre line and the SS stern tube had moved 1.06 mm toward the centre line. The two stern tubes had to be cut out and re-welded in position, a job that required a week to be completed. A costly repair of a repair, just because the welding plan was not followed.

Spotlight

»It occasionally happens that IACS rules and recommendations for welding in existing ship’s hull are followed« could have been avoided with a better planning of the welding operation.

Welding in rotary, or reciprocating, machinery without local grounding of the welding machine is very common in repair yards all over the world, and this creates severe damage to bearings. If the welding machine has its return cable connected central, and the welding is done in an engine, the engine bearings will act like electric capacitors and sparks will cause flashing of the white metal in the bearing. It occasionally happens that IACS (International Association of Classification Societies) rules and recommendations for welding in existing ship’s hull are followed, but not always. Weld in peace.

Main bearing shell damaged after welding in charge air cooler. Photo: Per Nyström

Case 3: This case originates from a normal steel repair and has nothing to do with groundings. A forest product carrier was in for repair at a shipyard in the Far East. Steel thickness measurements showed severe loss of

Camshaft bearing shell damaged by welding in engine foundation. Photo: Per Nyström

Case 2: A passenger ship had hit ground and was repaired in a European shipyard. After weld repair of the hull, alignments of the main engines were checked and it was found that one reduction gear had been displaced by 16 mm horizontally during the grounding and weld repair, a far from pleasant surprise to the owner, when the repair was considered completed. After moving the ship to another shipyard, repairs continued for several months before the problem could be solved by altering bearing positions, engine positions etc. A very costly alignment work that involved moving engine foundations had to be done due to poor workmanship at the initial repair. It goes without saying that the underwriter was not very happy. From the above it is evident that major steel repair in way of, or in the vicinity of, the engine room should always be planned based on the weld repair impact on the machinery alignment situation and sensitivity.

Welding flash in stern tube bearing.

Our strength – your benefit Please visit us at: www.kockumsonics.com, www.polarmarine.se, www.texon.se

82 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Technical Review Photo: Marine Electronics

MOL’s future ferry concept Ishin-II.

Super-slick bottom paint for less emissions environment Mitsui OSK Lines (MOL) has announced that its joint research and development (R&D) project on antifouling paints for ship bottoms will be incorporated into a government-industry initiative aimed at reducing CO2 emissions.

MOL, Nippon Paint and Nippon Paint Marine Coatings are jointly promoting R&D on high-performance antifouling paints that improve vessels’ fuel efficiency. This is a key element of MOL’s CO2 reduction technology R&D initiative. The drag of seawater over the vessel’s wetted surface accounts for 50 per cent to 80 per cent of all resistance, including wind and wave resistance. The R&D project aims to develop a super-slick antifouling paint for ship bottoms that will dramatically reduce fuel consumption. The paint used in the R&D project is expected to lower CO2 emissions 8% to 12% compared to conventional antifouling paints. This R&D project is a step toward realization of MOL’s vision for the vessels of the future, announced as ISHIN-I (car carrier) in September 2009 and ISHIN-II (ferry) in December 2009.

If you want a live and exclusive sneak-peak at Celebrity Cruises' Celebrity Eclipse, under construction at Meyer Werft in Papenburg, Germany, check out the shipping company's campaign at Twitter. Lucky winners can take a trip with the newbuilding a month before it arrives in UK for inauguration. The downer is that you need to be an Irish or UK-based Twitter user …

The Sea Echo system provides a 3D image of the sea up to one kilometre ahead of the tanker.

Ahead-looking sonar fitted to tanker Gear Guernsey-based Marine Electronics has installed a sonar system on one of BP’s MR tankers. The Sea Echo system has been developed together with the shipowner and is now undergoing a trials program. The system aims particularly to provide extra safety against grounding, but there are other advantages also according to the manufacturer.

The Sea Echo system provides a threedimensional image of the sea up to one kilometre ahead of the tanker. Two arrays fitted inside the bulbous bow scans ahead 20 degrees vertically and 90 degrees horizontally. Through fibre-optic cable, the data is sent to a high-definition screen on the bridge, where a 3-D image is created that can be combined with an electronic chart overlay. Since the picture shows underwater

objects, their depth and their position in relation to the ship, the system will also alert the bridge team of partly submerged objects such as lost-overboard containers and also whales and sea mammals ahead of the ship. Sea Echo also reveals ice thickness ahead, and according to the manufacturer, the system might be especially interesting for cruise vessels in Arctic and Antarctic waters. The BP tanker had the system fitted during a dry-docking in Dubai. An acoustic window made of a Kevlar and carbon fibre composite was fitted to the bow, and a seachest was constructed inside the bow to accommodate the sonar arrays. According to Marine Electronics, the size of the tanker is such that the flat window surface doesn’t affect hydrodynamics or fuel consumption.

Wipers shaped by end users equipment A new window wiper from Wiper Solve Marine will be launched at the Asia Pacific Maritime Exhibition in March. Also on display under the Wipasolv brand will be Straight Line wipers, a Pantograph wiper and details of the Clear View Screen, all of which will be controlled by the Controlasolv CANbus control system. “It seemed to me that the most logical step would be to listen to end users to find

out what they didn’t like about the products they were using and what they would like to see included in the future and then start anew, which is what we have done”, says Derek Poulton, Wiper Solve Marine’s Operations Director. Wiper Solve Marine is a newly formed joint venture 48 per cent owned by the Chairman and Managing Director of Solar Solve Marine.

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 83

Technical Review Photo: Subsea Industries

Photo: schottel

Thick layer of fouling on cruise ship could be removed without damage to the coating.

Good results with non-toxic coating Maintenance When a 294-metre cruise vessel came into drydock in the Bahamas after sailing with the Ecospeed coating from Subsea Industries for three years, the underwater hull needed touch ups on only two per cent of the total surface and no new paint layers were required on the rest of the underwater hull. The vessel could leave drydock again earlier than would have been the case if an extensive repaint had been required, Subsea Industries says in a press release.

The Schottel directors open the academy.

Schottel launches new academy education Schottel, manufacturer of propulsion systems, has launched a new academy where customers, captains, on-board personnel, external service engineers, sales partners and its own employees will receive specialist instruction in the operation and servicing of the company’s products.

“In view of steadily increasing requirements on marine propulsion and steering systems, their ability to communicate with other onboard systems, and ever greater complexity of shipyard operation, the instruction and training of personnel is

becoming more important, as every system is only as good as the service, installation and operating personnel”, the company says in a press release. Approximately 150 training modules have been developed that can be customized according to the level of knowledge of the target groups and used for individual or group training courses. Among the available courses are technical training relating to specific customer orders for ships’ personnel on site with practical training on board the vessel, and general technical training for ships’ personnel at Schottel in Spay.

Rudder repair without drydocking

The new equipment is lightweight and can be mobilized within hours to any port in the world. The new method allows engineers, welders and inspectors to perform their tasks in dry conditions. Steel repairs and replacements can be performed and pintle and bushing defects can be solved without the loss of time and money associated with drydocking, according to the company.

Photo: Hydrex

repair Belgium based Hydrex, specialized in underwater maintenance and repair services to shipowners, has developed a new method enabling permanent repairs of rudders without drydocking the ship.

Ecospeed is a once-in-a-lifetime coating that comes with a 10 year warranty. The coating is combined with an underwater cleaning and conditioning system, devised to remove any marine fouling at an early stage of development. Ecospeed’s non-stick properties make it difficult for fouling organisms to attach to the hull. Ecospeed’s surface characteristics steadily improve with each hull cleaning throughout the service life of the vessel. Good results could be seen also on a cruise ship that remained stationary in the Caribbean for seven months after it was coated with Ecospeed. After this period the coating’s qualities allowed a complete removal of all fouling from the underwater hull of the vessel during an underwater cleaning without causing any damage to the underlying paint layers. An impermeable barrier is created during application of Ecospeed. No rust or damage to the steel will be present on the underwater hull of the vessel after cleaning. The toxin-free coating consists of a surface treated composite. A composite is used to serve as a protective coating and its surface is treated to enhance its characteristics. For Ecospeed that means making the surface smoother and therefore more hydrodynamically efficient, i.e. less hull surface resistance and less fuel consumption.

84 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Technical Review Image: EAS

Preparation for new convention on recycling Recycling The Industry Working Group on Ship Recycling – which is coordinated by the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) – has published Guidelines on Transitional Measures for Shipowners Selling Ships for Recycling, in order to help improve conditions in yards, in advance of the entry into force of the new IMO Convention on Ship Recycling, adopted in Hong Kong in May 2009.

The Guidelines reflect the new ‘cradle to grave’ responsibilities of shipowners from the time of a ship’s construction to its final demolition, and explain the various actions that will be required. In particular, they encourage the maintenance of inventories of hazardous materials, in order to reduce risks to the safety and health of workers in ship recycling yards. They also recommend that shipowners endeavour to sell their redundant ships only to recycling facilities that meet the new IMO standards. The Guidelines demonstrate the commitment of the shipping industry to implementing the new global recycling standards prior to the entry into force of the IMO Convention, which ICS hopes will be ratified as soon as possible. The Guidelines are being distributed, free of charge, via national associations and can be downloaded at www.marisec. org/recycling.

ShipConstructor Nest Optimizer improves material utilization up to six per cent.

New ShipConstructor release for big projects Software The latest release of ShipConstructor, a 3D CAD/CAM software toolset for the shipbuilding and offshore industries, is specifically targeted for use on large-scale projects. ShipConstructor 2009 is compatible with AutoCAD 2009 and includes numerous enhancements designed to increase efficiency when working with complex 3D product models as well as features aimed at reducing production costs. Now the software will allow 64-bit capability on the Microsoft Windows Vista and Windows 7 platforms.

Significant improvements of the creation of 3D Virtual Reality (VR) models have been added and numerous visualisation options are also available. The automated nesting capabilities are improved with the introduction of an enhanced nest optimization engine. Test results have shown clients can expect up to a six per cent improvement in overall plate utilization. ShipConstructor 2009 includes a new intelligent Distributed Systems Supports module, which is a rule-based program for the creation of distributed system supports such as pipe and HVAC. In line with the company’s other efforts to enhance Design for Production (DFP), the software allows an experienced designer to inject knowledge-based rules into the library of supports that are available during the 3D modelling process.

This enhanced module offers parametric design based on a broad range of industry standard supports. Each support is associated with a set of pipes and pipe hangers as well as foundational structure, allowing the support to be constrained and automatically adapt to design changes as the project progresses. Another DFP-based enhancement allows for the standardization of commonly used assemblies, including items such as simple panels, ladders, pipe manifolds, handrails and equipment complete with standard foundations. In addition to allowing common items to be modelled once and used many times, these Standard Assemblies include the production documentation required for fabrication, with 3D assembly drawings for each stage in fabrication. When changes are made to the Standard Assembly definition or the related construction documents, all instances where it has been used are automatically changed as well. This latest version of ShipConstructor provides an intuitive set of tools that allows modellers to allocate space for the various systems (pipe, HVAC, electrical etc) well before they are modelled. The allocated space is parametrically associated with the wireways in the upcoming ShipConstructor Electrical module. Changes to the allocated space will be automatically propagated to the detailed electrical system model.

Always at your service

Quays

Dry dock

Crane Capacity

195m x 34m x 7m

West Quay 130 and 90 tonnes

West Quay:

Crane capacity

The 130 tonne crane also serves the South Quay

North Quay 1: Length 115m, depth 6m

50 and 20 tonnes

Length 260m, depth 8m

North Quay 2: Length 155m, depth 6m South Quay: Length 260m, depth 7m

Azimuth pit: 9 m x 5 m, depth 3 m

Ă&#x2013;resundsvarvet AB Box 701 261 27 Landskrona Sweden

Phone +46 418 565 80 Fax +46 418 565 89 info@oresundsvarvet.se www.oresundsvarvet.se

Telephone (outside office hours) +46 +46 +46 +46 +46 +46 +46

(0) (0) (0) (0) (0) (0) (0)

70 70 70 70 70 73 70

565 543 565 565 565 765 565

80 15 80 08 18 65 07

68 67 15 56 55 01 39

J. Hansson A. Larsson B. Lindgren T. MĂĽnsson M. Nyholm N. Karlsson I. Olteanu

www.oresundsvarvet.se

86 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Fleet Review Photo: Combi Dock Shipping

Photo: pär-henrik sjöström

The sister ships Nedgard and Belgard.

Meriaura charters back business In December 2009 the Finnish shipping company Meriaura Ltd has sold its 3,000 dwt dry cargo vessel Eeva to Estonian interests. She was handed over to her new owners on December 30 and is now under the management of Klip Marine Shipmanagement OÜ. Renamed Eeland, Meriaura has taken the vessel back on charter. It is stated that Meriaura will use the capital resources for “further development of multipurpose heavy cargo vessel concept”.

Rettig Group Ltd Bore has sold its two 3,000 dwt sister ships Belgard and Nedgard, which have been laid up in Mariehamn. The vessels were bought by the same Estonian owners that took over the Eeva. Meriaura has also taken these two cargo vessels on charter from the beginning of the year 2010. Now named Belland and Nedland, they are built in Germany in 1986 and 1987 respectively. The boxed hold has one hatch and the volume is 4,920 cbm grain. In order to strengthen its geographical coverage of marketing and sales Meriaura has established the affiliated company Meriaura OÜ in Tallinn.

Kalkke sold sale The port of Rauma has sold its tug Kalkke, which has been on charter to Alfons Håkans. She was sold for EUR 350,000 to Rahja-Lines Oy in Oulu and will be operated by R-Towing Oy in Kalajoki. Managing Director Pekka Rahja says that the tug at least initially will continue operating under her present name. Built in Rauma by the Hollming shipyard in 1965, the Kalkke is powered by a 1,260 hp Nohab diesel engine, providing a bollard pull of 15 tons.

The Combi Dock IV.

Combi Dock quartet completed delivery The German/Danish joint venture Combi Dock Shipping has taken delivery of the last of its quartet of combined heavylift/ dock-ships from Lloydwerft at Bremerhaven. The fourth vessel was named Combi Dock IV in a ceremony with Maria König Poulsen, wife of Peter Poulsen, head of Sales and Marketing at J. Poulsen Shipping, as sponsor.

Shortly after the naming ceremony the vessel took off on its maiden voyage loading in Rotterdam, Le Havre and then again in Rotterdam before leaving for Apapa-Lagos, Nigeria, en route for Shanghai for final discharge. This pattern is quit normal for the Combidock vessels (apart from Combi Dock II, which under the name Blue Gaint is working under a charter in an offshore project out of Tuxpan, Mexico) as they combine their way across the globe between Europe/ Asia/USA with project cargo and large components and even smaller ships. They can be loaded in the cargo hold, which can be used as a floating dock and take floating cargo up to a length of 132 metres with a breadth of 18 metres and a draft

of 4.5 metres. Cargo can also be lifted on board using the three deck cranes. Two of the cranes have a capacity of 350 tons and the third can lift up 200 tons. The cargo hold is even fitted for dangerous cargos and covered by smoke detectors, CO2 and sprinklers. The Combi Dock IV is like it sisters built by Lloydwerft with the steel hull from Gdansk in Poland. The ship measures 162.3 metres on a breadth on 25.4 m. The deadweight is 11,000 tons on a draft of 6.6 metres. The engine plant is a MAN-diesel type 9L32/40 developing 9,000 kW to at service speed of 16 knots. Combi Dock IV is flying the flag of Antigua and Barbuda with St. Johns as port of registry in dual registration under German flag. The technical management is taken care by the German Harren & Partner of Bremen, while the commercial management is in the hands of J. Poulsen Shipping at Korsør in their subsidiary Combi Lift Shipping K/S. There have been some rumours of several more sister ships, but the two options have not been exercised.

The Norwegian car carrier operator Partner Shipping AS, which operates the NAPA (North America Pacific Asia) service in a strategic joint partnership with the Praxis Logistics, will introduce the third car carrier on the service in February 2010. The new-building Ocean Challenger will be taken on long term charter by Partner Shipping from Mitsui & Co in Japan.

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 87

The editor of the Fleet review section is Pär-Henrik Sjöström, contact him at par-henrik@shipgaz.com

Fleet Review Photo: bent mikkelsen

Photo: fred. olsen Cruise Lines

The Mærsk Launcher.

New ship to Maersk Supply

There will also be several other Titanic-related activities and lectures, even the food and entertainment will be similar as on the epic maiden voyage. For the memorial cruise the Balmoral will be chartered by the British travel firm Miles Morgan Travel from its owner Fred. Olsen Cruise Lines. On this cruise the Balmoral will take 1,309 guests, the same number as were on board the Titanic.

The Bow Maaslot will be broken up in India.

The Balmoral.

Cruise vessel in Titanic memorial history Exactly hundred years after the ocean liner Titanic went down with a heavy loss of lives, the cruise vessel Balmoral will be on the same position to commemorate the disaster. The Balmoral will sail from Southampton on April 8, 2012 via the roads of Cherbourg and Cobh on Ireland, for a twelve night cruise, following the same route as the Titanic hundred years earlier.

After the memorial service on the North Atlantic on the night between April 15 and 15, the Balmoral will continue to Nova Scotia, which became the final resting place for many of those who did not survive the Titanic-disaster. The destination of Balmoral is New York,

Maersk Supply Service to re-flag fleet Maersk Supply Service decided to re-flag the entire British flagged supply vessel fleet to Denmark. Presently Maersk Supply Service has a fleet of 17 vessels sailing under the Isle of Man-flag. “The decision was taken to make the ownership more transparent and more simple”, says Carsten Plougmann Andersen, CEO of Maersk Supply. “We will advance slowly during 2010 with no rush and try to avoid all problems with reflagging. We have taken into consideration that we continue to employ the English offic-

ers under Danish flag without any problems, as both UK and Denmark are EU-members.” The Isle of Man-flagged fleet includes the oldest supply ships in the whole Maersk Supply fleet – the 1979-built Maersk Retriever, and the sister vessel Maersk Rider, delivered in 1982. Both vessels have been on longterm employment in Brazilian waters. They have been withdrawn from normal supply duties and have for some time been working as special vessel for oil-spill service, where they are standby at sea.

Photo: Bent Mikkelsen

where she will dock on April 19, 2012. In Scandinavia bookings for the Titanic Memorial Cruise are made by Escape Travel, informing that the Swedish Titanic-expert Claes-Göran Wetterholm will be on board during the leg between Southampton and Cobh, giving lectures about the Titanic.

newbuilding The heavy-duty workhorse Mærsk Launcher became the very first newbuilding for Danish A P Møller-Mærsk in 2010. The vessel was delivered on January 19 at Stavanger, Norway, where the bollard pull test was done showing a static pull of 257 tons. The newbuilding, hull no. 479 from Volkswerft Stralsund, is the fourth in a series of six super-anchorhandlers in the fleet of Maersk Supply Service, the subsidiary that now owns and runs the 55-strong fleet of offshore supply vessels. The Mærsk Launcher starts its career by conducting several cargo runs for Maersk Oil and Gas from their base facilities at Esbjerg to installation in the Danish sector of the North Sea.

Parcel tankers to recycling recycling The Oslo Stock Exchange listed shipping company Odfjell has recently sold the coated chemical/product tankers Bow Maasslot and Bow Maasstroom to India for recycling. According to Odfjell the sales price is close to the book value for both vessels. The owner also informs that the vessels have Green Passport and that the recycling yard shall submit a working plan corresponding to IMO guidelines for ship recycling.

88 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Fleet Review Photo: LJL

Photo: www.shipspotting.com

40 years of sailing for reefer recycling In the second week of January 2010 the Ecuadorian owned reefer vessel Celtic Sea arrived at Alang, India, for recycling at the wellknown beach near by in the Bhavnagar province. The arrival took place a few weeks after the vessel could celebrate its 40 years birthday after the delivery from Aalborg Værft on December 23, 1969, to J. Lauritzen. At the time of delivery it was named Nippon Reefer and was the second in the famous series of modern reefer vessels with 422,000 cubicfeet of cargo space under the decks.

The vessel was lengthened in 1996 at Jurong Shipyard in Singapore increasing the capacity from 422,000 cubicfeet to 593,000 cubicfeet Celtic Sea left Guayaquil on November 23, 2009 for the last time with a full cargo of bananas for Rijeka in Croatia and Bar in Montenegro, which was called on December 18.

The 1985-built Svilas.

Two ex Swedes sold sale The Lithuanian Shipping Company LJL has sold the 9,650 dwt general cargo vessels Staris and Svilas on auction on December 15, 2009. The company had bought the vessels from B&N Nordsjöfrakt in January 2002, then named the Concord and Macado. The recent buyers are from Greece and Lebanon and the vessels will be handed over one and a half or two months after the auction. The vessels have been operated by Onego Shipping’s Rotterdam office.

Simultaneously the charter was cut to two to three months. “Staris and Svilas have served with us for seven years and they are rather good ships, but it is quite common to send more than 20 years old ships to the scrapyard. However, these are of better quality than the half as old vessels that were built in Huelva with Lithuanian hulls,” LJL’s Director General Vytautas Vismantas says and is referring to the Asta-type. “Due to their age the Staris and Svilas often became subjects of extraordinary port state controls. It is neither a secret that we have debts. The freight rates are stabilized on the present low level and perhaps they don’t fall more, which means that our most difficult year probably is over.”

The Staris and Svilas are built 1985 in Germany. According to LJL’s financial report for the first half of the year 2009, their freight rates were less than half of the rates of 2008.

Newbuilding contracts in the Nordic market Month

Owner

Nat

Dwt

Type

Shipyard

Delivery

Nov

Havila Shipping

4,000

psv

Simek

8.10

Value

South African Gvm

SAf

134 m

research

STX Finland

EUR 116 m

Fob Shipping

40 m

catam

Måløy Verft

NOK 43.5 m

Dec

Veolia Nord

24 m

catam

Båtservice Verft-92

Ervik & Sævik

80 m

fishing

Karstensens Skibsverft 5.11

Remarks Havyard 832CB polar research windpower service carbon-fibre

NOK 250 m

Siem Consub

No/Bz

4,700

psv

STX Europe Brazil

2q12

USD 80 m

PSV09CD

Siem Consub

No/Bz

4,700

psv

STX Europe Brazil

2q13

USD 80 m

PSV09CD

Siem Consub

No/Bz

oilrec

ETP Shipyard

Ulstein P801

Siem Consub

No/Bz

oilrec

ETP Shipyard

Ulstein P801

Island Offshore

4,100

psv

STX Europe Brevik

4q11

NOK 400 m

UT776CD

Island Offshore

4,100

psv

STX Europe Brevik

1q12

NOK 400 m

UT776CD

Jan

Stena Bulk

158,000

tanker

Samsung

USD 67.5m

Stena Bulk

158,000

tanker

Samsung

USD 67.5m

Stolt-Nielsen

Int

44,000

tanker

SLS Shipbuilding

2.10

ex-cancelled order

Stolt-Nielsen

Int

44,000

tanker

SLS Shipbuilding

2.10

ex-cancelled order

Stolt-Nielsen

Int

44,000

tanker

SLS Shipbuilding

7.10

ex-cancelled order

Stolt-Nielsen

Int

44,000

tanker

SLS Shipbuilding

7.10

ex-cancelled order

All details believed to be correct but not guaranteed.

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 89

Fleet Review Secondhand transactions in the Nordic market Month Name

Dwt

Built

Type

From

Price

Buyer

Nov

Nord Sincere

28,306

2008

bulk

DS Norden, Copenhagen

USD 25.0 m

Precious Shipping, China

Remarks/New name

Scio Star

23,465

1987

container

KS Tiger Sea, Mariager

USD 2.8 m

Setubal

16,500

1997

container

Handy Container KS, Oslo

Philippines Container Leasing, Cph

Pentathlon

164,000

2002

tanker

Tsakos Energy, Piraeus

USD 51.5 m

Nordic American, Sandefjord

Mahakam

69,997

1996

bulk

KS Parbulk II, Oslo

USD 17.5 m

undisclosed

Philippine

3,520

1995

LPG

Lyonesse Marine, Paris

USD 7.4 m

Orkla KS, Oslo

Kohfu

6,544

1986

reefer

Agder Ocean R III, Grimstad

USD 4 m

Russia

Saxo

Wilson Mo

1,717

1981

dry cargo

Rederiet Saxo, Nørrsundby

DKK 2.1 m

Hav Bulk KS, Bergen

5,790

1975

bulk

Wilson ASA, Bergen

USD 460,000

Syria

Althea Gas

82,557c 2003

LPG

Iino Kaiun, Tokyo

USD 55 m

Stolt-Nielsen Gas, Oslo

Torm Rotna

75,971

bulk

DS Torm, Copenhagen

USD 29 m

undisclosed

2001

Torm Charlotte

75,944

2005

bulk

DS Torm, Copenhagen

USD 35 m

undisclosed

Long Charity

174,004

1985

bulk

Einar Lange, Oslo

USD 13.7 m

China

Maersk Priority

105,635

2004

tanker

A P Møller Maersk, Cph

USD 44.0 m

Solstrand resale

4,000

2010

psv

Supply-Service canx

Clipper Lake

Hovden

28,400

2001

bulk

Clipper, Copenhagen

1,128

1969

reefer

Sealine Transport, Florø

Vietnam Havila Shipping, Fosnavåg

USD 19 m

undisclosed AZ Shipping, Klaipeda

Sava Hill

3,103

1991

bulk

Myklebusthaug, Fonnes

Frakt & Sandsölan, Faroes

Boe Sea

7,938

1988

bulk

TKB Shipping, Copenhagen

Wind Shipping, Greece

Boe Gulf

7,938

1988

bulk

TKB Shipping, Copenhagen

undisclosed

Boe Sea

7,938

1989

bulk

TKB Shipping, Copenhagen

undisclosed

Boe Strait

7,938

1989

bulk

TKB Shipping, Copenhagen

undisclosed

Boa Master

359*

1994

tug

Taubåtkompaniet, Trondheim

Palmali Tugs, Istanbul

Autoline

7,087* 1983

car carrier

UECC, Oslo

Unifleet, Syria

Autotransporter

7,087* 1983

car carrier

UECC, Oslo

Unifleet, Syria

Dec

Siem Swordfish

5,372* 2007

mpsv

Siem Offshore, Krs S

Leistein

4,775

bulk

Inter-Carib, Oslo

1996

USD 61 m

charterers Berge Rederi, Trondheim

Kongshavn

16,405* 1979

ferry

Nordenfjeldske DS, Trh

EUR 6.0 m

Croatia

Tor Neringa

12,494* 1975

roro

Brax Shipholding, Gothenburg

EUR 2.5 m

Moby Lines, Italy

Knock Nevis

Chemtrans Lyra

Fjordbris

Sagaland

564,763

1976

fso

Fred Olsen Energy, Oslo

USD 28.6 m

breaking India

97,097

1993

tanker

Chemikalien, Hamburg

USD 12.0 m

Fred Olsen Production, Oslo

236* 1991 64,000

1982

catamaran

Tide ASA, Bergen

Turkey

bulk

Imperial Sh, Göteborg

China

USD 5.5 m

Millennium 2

1,100

2001

tanker

Desas Denizcilik, Istanbul

Tamina Shipping, Göteborg

Dania Kirsten

3,000

1976

bulk

ShipCargo, Ålborg

Greece

Sembawang resale

182 m

2012

heavylift

Nordic Heavy Lift, Oslo

De Poli resale

9,500

2010

tanker

yard liquidators

De Poli resale

9,500

2010

Fjordprinsessen

340* 1999

USD 260 m

tanker

yard liquidators

Utkilen, Bergen

catamaran

Hurtigruten ASA, Tromsø

NOK 9.5 m

Torghatten Nord, Tromsø

NOK 7.5 m

Vågsfjord

177* 1999

catamaran

Hurtigruten ASA, Tromsø

Fjorddronningen II

571* 1995

catamaran

Hurtigruten ASA, Tromsø

Jan

Aasfjord

Bow Maasslot

Acergy Utkilen, Bergen

Torghatten Nord, Tromsø Greece

4,700

1978

bulk

Aasen Sh, Mosterhamn

Sarunto AS, Haugesund

38,039

1982

tanker

Odfjell SE, Bergen

beaking India

Vingtor

BW Clipper

78,500c 1991

478* 1990

BW Challenger

78,500c 1992

Gitte 3

4,296* 1989

catamaran

Tide ASA, Bergen

Greece

LPG

BW Gas, Oslo

USD 35 m

Pacific Carriers, Singapore

LPG

BW Gas, Oslo

USD 35 m

ferry

HH Ferries, Helsingør

Pacific Carriers, Singapore breaking Grenaa

Gan-Victory

46,000

2007

tanker

Dunya Shipping, Istanbul

USD 53 m

Platou KS, bb Torm

Gan-Valour

46,000

2007

tanker

Dunya Shipping, Istanbul

en bloc

Platou KS, bb Torm

Gan-Shield

51,200

2007

tanker

Dunya Shipping, Istanbul

USD 79 m

DS Norden, Copenhagen

Gan-Spirit

51,200

2007

tanker

Dunya Shipping, Istanbul

en bloc

DS Norden, Copenhagen

Gan-Shield

51,200

2008

tanker

Dunya Shipping, Istanbul

en bloc

* = gross tons

c = capacity in cubic metres

DS Norden, Copenhagen All details believed to be correct but not guaranteed.

90 Shipgaz No 1 2010

By Dag Bakka jr, dag@shipgaz.com

Retro Stolt-Nielsen 50 years

Photo: Paal Audestad / Aftenposten

Jacob Stolt-Nielsen: 50 years of entrepreneurship When Jacob Stolt-Nielsen stepped down as chairman of Stolt-Nielsen SA on December 15, 2009, it was exactly on the company’s 50th anniversary. Jacob Stolt-Nielsen left the position to Christer Olsson, formerly head of Wallenius, but remains on the board along with his sons Jacob B and Niels Gregers. With its global commercial presence and 5,000 employees around the world, the company has been largely shaped by Mr Stolt-Nielsen himself. Jacob, the innovator, ambitious and occasionally arrogant, impulsive and impatient, unconventional yet firm on dress code, but above all with entrepreneurial zest for new business and new concepts.

Born in Haugesund in 1931 into a family of shipowners, Jacob was the only child of Jacob Stolt-Nielsen and Ruth, née Amlie, whose father was also a shipowner. Jacob’s grandfather,

Botholf (1863– 1936) had been the largest shipowner in town during the First World War, but lost most his fortune in the post-war collapse. Jacob’s father and uncle carried on with two elderly steamers and a herring export business. At the age of 21, young Jacob went to London for studies and shipping practice and from there to New York. During the spring of 1954 he was accepted as assistant to Russel J Chianelli, one of a handful of shipbrokers who specialized in the infant trade of “solvents”, the range of chemicals for use by the petrochemical industries.

»Ambitious and occasionally arrogant, impulsive and impatient, but above all with entrepreneurial zest«

There was no family empire waiting for him back in Haugesund. He had to form his own.

Every so often in shipping history, the true innovators and pioneers fail to make commercial success of their brainchild. Not so with Jacob Stolt-Nielsen. Back in 1955 in New York, he grasped the idea of shipping several consignments in one vessel, rather than using small tankers of 3,000–4,000 dwt for transatlantic voyages. With Chianelli and Charles Steuber as partners, the Norwegian 13,000dwt tanker Freddy was taken on a twelve-month time charter and had her fitted with 19 deepwell pumps instead of the conventional common pipelines and pump room configura-

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 91

Stolt-Nielsen 50 years

Retro Photo: Olav Opedal

The Stolt Avance (13,580 dwt), StoltNielsen’s first tanker as she is leaving Haugesund in December 1961, with an early Stolt-Nielsen houseflag on her funnel. tion. By introducing a larger vessel, freight cost per ton could be lowered, and they profited nicely on the charter.

After a few more ventures and a profit of USD 100,000 in his pocket, Jacob returned to Oslo in September 1959 to acquire a suitable vessel of his own. Through his friend Peter Fr Bassøe of R S Platou he was offered the 13,000 dwt Rimfonn, British-built from 1949, although she was larger and more expensive than intended. The vessel was laid up in Stavanger and the price was negotiated to GBP 260,000 (NOK 5.2 mill = USD 730,000). Alone, Jacob tried to convince the Platou people of a joint-venture with himself as majority owner. As he felt the ambition slipping, Ragnar Stoud Platou himself, the legendary shipbroker, entered the room, heard the argument and offered “would 60/40 do for you?” Platou took 40 per cent in KS Avance & Co, which meant that Jacob had to put up NOK 1 million in equity – the entire capital he had saved and raised. The vessel was taken over, renamed Stolt Avance in commemoration of his grandfather’s first vessel

»The crew was summoned and he explained what had to be done: They would have to scale the bulkheads by hammer!« back in 1891, and sent to the Hauge sund shipyard for conversion into a parcel tanker. This basically included dismantling the old pipe lines for the twelve tanks consigned to chemicals, and fitting of new stainless steel piping and additional pumps. The remaining 15 tanks were assigned to vegoil, and here the old pipes were retained. The yard gave 100 per cent credit for the NOK 5 million job.

Management of the tanker was delegated to his father’s company in Haugesund, and the vessel was manned by Norwegian seafarers. She was timechartered to Jacob’s company Parcel Tankers Inc, registered in Liberia. He had spent his proverbial last penny on the vessel and bought fuel oil on credit. The cargo was ready in

Biography Those interested in further information of Mr Stolt-Nielsen and his business career should turn to the authorized biography “Jacob Stolt-Nielsen. En gründer”, published in Norwegian by Kristian Ilner in 2009. More details at www.vigmostadbjorke.no

Houston with cancellation date on December 31, 1959. The Stolt Avance arrived, but the ballast voyage had been rough to the vegoil tanks where scales of corrosion could be peeled off. Jacob realised that the tanks would be turned down for loading. Something had to be done, and he went for the cheap solution. The crew was summoned and he explained what had to be done: They would have to scale the bulkheads by hammer! The shipowner, officers and crew worked through the New Year’s Eve, and when the time was up and one tank remained, Jacob surrendered. He called the men on deck for cold beer and hamburgers.

The charterers, however, had been impressed by the effort and accepted extension of the cancellation date. The Stolt Avance was duly loaded and departed, while Jacob went home to New York to join his wife Nadia, who had just given birth to their second child. A year later Jacob gave up his partnership with Chianelli and started Stolt-Nielsen Chartering Inc at 80 Broad Street, Manhattan. Today, Stolt Tankers & Terminals ranks as the leading provider of trans-

92 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Retro Stolt-Nielsen 50 years Photo: Frank Morten Bale

The fifth of six sisters from STX Norway, the Stena Groenland of 43,478 dwt, fitting out at the Florø shipyard. As she left the yard in December 2009, the yard was soon to give up shipbuilding in order to focus on offshore maintenance work. Photo: Stolt-Nielsen SA

The Stolthaven terminal Santos.

»Jacob was increasingly annoyed with the refusal to join the European Union and the tight government control of the offshore industry« portation and storage of bulk liquid chemicals, edible oils, acids and other demanding liquids. This is served by a network of terminals and offices in 20 countries around the world, served by a fleet of 70 deepsea chemical carriers and 80 coastal and inland tankers. In addition, group affiliates like Stolt Tank Containers, Stolt Bitumen Services and Stolt-Nielsen Gas cover related markets.

But it all began on Manhattan 50 years ago. A group of young Norwegians were recruited in Stolt-Nielsen Chartering as the operation expanded to 8–9 parcel tankers by 1962. From the beginning, ships were nominated from US Gulf to Europe and Japan with chemicals, solvents, lubeoil and edible fats. During the season, other ships were loading lard, tallow and vegoil on the Great Lakes for Europe. Two more 13,000-tonners were acquired, but the future expansion would be with owned and chartered 16,000–19,000-tonners. In 1962, an office in Tokyo was opened, followed by Stolt-Nielsen Shipping AS in Oslo the following year. Here an in-house shipbroking operation was set up under Ole Jacob Libæk, whereas Øystein

FRESH WATER MAKERS • Fully automatic • Low power consumption • From 1-10,000 m3 /24 hours • More then 2300 installations world wide

Enwa AB Backa Strandgata 8 422 46 Hisings Backa, Sweden Tel: +46 (0)31 - 742 92 50 Fax: +46 (0)31 - 742 92 60 www.enwa.com info@enwa.se

No 1 2010 Shipgaz 93

Stolt-Nielsen 50 years

Retro Photo: Stolt-Nielsen SA

Arvesen came from Berge Sigval Bergesen to head the technical department.

As business volume and profit built up, the first newbuilding programme was initiated in 1970, a series of 25,000 dwt tankers at Boelwerf in Belgium. Innovative ships with double bottom and skin, cargo tanks in stainless steel or epoxy coated, stainless pipes and deepwell cargo pumps from Framo, the Stolt Sydness-series set the standard for the future parcel tankers and IMO specifications. In 1964, Jacob and his Lebaneseborn wife Nadia and children moved back to Norway and settled in Oslo. Here, the four children – Siri, Lise, Jacob and Niels Gregers – grew up to become Norwegians. During his years in Norway, he became involved in the infant industry of fish-farming. which would eventually develop into Stolt Sea Farm, and in 1973 into offshore services. Seaway Supply & Support Ships would soon focus on subsea services and construction under the title Stolt-Nielsen Seaway.

Jacob, however, was increasingly annoyed with the political development in Norway with the refusal to join the European Union and the tight government control of the offshore industry. In 1978 they moved back to America. Also the shipping activities in Norway were scaled back as the ships were sold or transferred to Liberia in 1972/1974 and the management moved to Greenwich, Connecticut. By the mid 1970s, New York and Oslo were the main hubs of the parcel

Five operations Stolt-Nielsen SA is the parent company to the following operations with 33 offices around the world and 5,000 employees: Stolt Tankers & Terminals, including 8 terminals, 150 tankers and ship management, carrying 25 million tons per year; Stolt Tank Containers, operating 23,500 units for bulk-liquids; Stolt-Nielsen Gas, formed in 2007 operating 2 VLGCs; Stolt Bitumen Services AsiaPacific and Stolt Sea Farm, with 9 marine farms in Spain, Portugal, France and Norway. trade, with offices in Rotterdam, Singapore, Manila, Tokyo, Houston, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires and Sydney. The Norwegians were by now outnumbered in an international staff of Americans, Dutch, Swedes, Danes, Australians, etc. One of them was Torben Karlshøj, a Dane who was recruited to head a new General Product Trade department in Greenwich. He moved on in 1973 to form Teekay Shipping Group. The Stolt-Nielsen fleet was by now given a uniform colour scheme. A particular blend, “primrose yellow”, was chosen and has become a conspicuous brand together with the logo of

Stolt Sagaland (44,044 dwt) leaving the STX Norway Florø shipyard in February 2008 as the lead ship in a series of six stainless steel tankers.

two red shapes against a white background, forming an S.

Heading three complex and industrial operations through decades of dramatic change must have taken the stamina of a marathon runner and the alertness of a fighter pilot. The challenge has not only been to survive, but to strike on opportunities and adapt to structural changes. For Jacob Stolt-Nielsen this became a daily test, a way of life, for more than half a century. Much has rested with having the right leaders and a skilled and motivated staff, but it has taken a lot of

Worldwide spare part deliveries for ships

MOTOR-SERVICE SWEDEN AB Please contact us for prices & delivery times

MOTOR-SERVICE SWEDEN AB Address Mölna Fabriksväg 8, SE-610 72 Vagnhärad, Sweden Telephone +46-(0)156 340 40 Telefax +46-(0)156 209 40 E-mail sales@motor-service.se Website www.motor-service.se

94 Shipgaz No 1 2010

Retro Stolt-Nielsen 50 years Photo: Stolt-Nielsen SA / Woodallen Photography

focus and hard decisions. There have been periods of distress and bad sleep, but also moments of success and fulfilment. Mostly, however, long working days, tedious flights, meetings; steps in the process to achieve and reach the next goal. In the 1990s, Stolt Tankers & Terminals emerged as the result of a long series of ventures and consolidation. Stolt Offshore was developed from a niche subsea contractor into a global integrated offshore contractor with 7,000 employees. Stolt Sea Farm went all the way in salmon farming, until that part was sold off and consolidated into John Fredriksen’s Marine Har-

The Stolthaven Terminal Houston with the Stolt Sneland, another Florø-built vessel.

vest, while Stolt focused on higheryield specialities like turbot, sturgeon and caviar.

There have been tough decisions like selling Stolt Offshore in 2005; to Jacob’s despair for giving up half his achievement. But at the time the antitrust case brought up by the US government cast its looming shadow over the Stolt-Nielsen group. The consequence could be utter ruin for Stolt-Nielsen SA, which after all had disclosed the illegal cooperation with Odfjell and JO Tankers in 2002. The ruling by the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on

Norwegian … and not Stolt-Nielsen SA is often considered a Norwegian company abroad, even though it is formally registered in Luxembourg and has commercial headquarters for its different businesses spread around the world. Jacob Stolt-Nielsen and his family are Norwegian citizens.

In this international organization there are still several Norwegians and other Scandinavians in the corporate structure and in the shipping department.

Today it is only Bermuda based Stolt-Nielsen Gas Ltd,

which recently acquired its first vessel the Althea Gas of 82,500 cbm, that has any shipping operations in Norway. The sizeable fleet is not listed as Norwegian by the Norwegian Shipowners Association, ISL-Bremen or other statistical sources.

November 30, 2007, was full support to Stolt-Nielsen who was found justified to its amnesty. Jacob Stolt-Nielsen stepped down as CEO in 2000 and left the reins to his younger son, Niels Gregers. With the antitrust case settled and the group refocused on its transportation business, new ventures were established, like the bitumen shipping in SouthEast Asia and Stolt-Nielsen Gas.

Since retiring as Chairman in December 2009, Jacob Stolt-Nielsen divides his time between his farm at Grasse on the French Riviera and his home in Norway, but is also spending periods of time in London and USA. As a true entrepreneur Jacob StoltNielsen has led an intensive professional life since leaving Haugesund almost 60 years ago. A never-resting mind, constantly at work with ideas and concepts, seeking fulfilment in making deals and seeing projects materialise. In short, he has been at the right place at the right time – again and again, and where others have seen obstacles, he has focused on the potential.

SSG219X303

22-01-10 23:12

™ÂÏ›‰· 1

Posidonia 2010 7-11 June 2010 Hellenikon Exhibition Centre, Athens, Greece

Your opportunity The biggest gathering in the shipping calendar with the owners of the world's largest fleet. Welcome to the home of shipping

The International Shipping Exhibition

Organisers: Posidonia Exhibitions SA, e-mail: posidonia@posidonia-events.com Tel. + 30 210 428 3608, Fax + 30 210 428 3610

www.posidonia-events.com

In 1927 …

… the Swedish cargo steamer Kalix, owned by the Grängesberg company, was already 15 years old, but still in the very beginning of her long career. The 4,960 dwt single decker was built in 1913 by Sir Raylton Dixon’s shipyard in Middlesbrough, UK, and served all her life for the same owner. In December 1958 she was sold to be broken up in Germany, but the government put obstacles to this and she ended her days at Carl Persson & Söner in Ystad, Sweden, in 1959. The picture is taken on the roads of Narvik in Norway on June 6, 1927. The port’s own quay is behind the vessel while the facilities of LKAB for export of iron ore are outside the picture to the left.

98 Shipgaz No 1 2010

By Pär-Henrik Sjöström par-henrik@shipgaz.com

Retro Pohjanmaa

Picture: Håkan Sjöström

Levant trader taken by Soviet Originally built for a Stockholm owner, the Pohjanmaa traded for Svenska Orient Linien before she ended up in Finland just before World War II. At the time of shipowner Dan Broström’s untimely death in a car accident in 1925, the Broström Group of companies had a fleet with a total deadweight exceeding 300,000 tons. The Gothenburg-based Tirfing Steamship Company (Ångfartygsaktiebolaget Tirfing) was the main shipping company in the group, mainly employing its vessels in ore shipments and on the Levant trade.

Especially for the Levant service, operated as the Svenska Orient Linien, Tirfing ordered a series of motor vessels in the late 1920s. They were built by the Broström-owned shipyard Eriksbergs Mekaniska Verkstad in Gothenburg and based on a successful design earlier introduced on the trade by the partially owned shipping company Svenska Lloyd. A total of four vessels of this type were built, of which three to Tirfing. The first vessel in the series was the Hemland, which was handed over to Tirfing in April 1929. The second ves-

sel Manhem was delivered to Rederi AB Manhem in Stockholm in September the same year. They were followed by a further two Tirfing-vessels, the Gotland in December 1929 and the Blåland in April 1930. The Manhem was reported to have interiors built in a solid and tasteful style, with a superstructure between hatches 2 and 3 and another deck house aft of hatch 3. The 3,050 dwt cargo liner was powered by a 2,000 hp Burmeister & Wain diesel engine, built on license by the shipyard. The machinery gave her a service speed of 13 knots when fully loaded.

»Her interiors were built in tasteful and solid style« In 1927 the Broström-owned Rederi AB SverigeLevanten had been liquidated. Its activities were included in Tirfing and operated under the name Svenska Orient Linien.

Tirfing was so pleased with their newbuildings that they decided to buy the fourth sister. In 1931 Tirfing and Manhem traded vessels so that the Manhem was handed over to Tirfing while Manhem got Tirfing’s cargo

steamer Grekland in exchange. In Tirfing’s ownership the Manhem was renamed Nordland.

The Nordland traded for the Orient Line until September 1938, when she was sold to the Finnish Steamship Company (Finska Ångfartygs Aktiebolaget) and renamed Pohjanmaa. The Finnish Steamship Company cooperated with the Orient Line on the Levant trade and had before that bought several vessels from Tirfing – the Roland, renamed Savonmaa in 1936, the Erland, renamed Saimaa in 1937, and the Småland, renamed Dione in the same year. The Pohjanmaa saw only a short career under the Finnish flag. In September 1939, World War II put an end to the free trade on the seas and in 1945 the Pohjanmaa was handed over to the Soviet Union as part of the war reparations. She traded as the Pulkovo for the Baltic Shipping Company in Leningrad until she was broken up in Leningrad 1968.

POSTTIDNING