BOATS & GEAR Vessel Design
Space Craft Operators focus on crew needs, carrying capacity. By Michael Crowley, Correspondent
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ost workboat operators share a common concern — occasionally finding themselves shorthanded. Then there are barge operators who would love to build a vessel with better fuel economy. This issue’s design feature focuses on how two companies are addressing those issues. Breaking out of old patterns and habits can be tricky. You don’t want to alienate the very people you’re trying to help. How far do you go in the new direction? Is it done incrementally or with a deep dive? Crowley Maritime Corp., Jacksonville, Fla., appears to be taking the deep dive route as it seeks to strengthen crew retention. “We’re trying to attract talent and encourage people to come and work on Crowley engineered designs,” said Cole Van Gundy, Crowley Maritime’s vice president of engineering, while at the same time noting that “mariners of today are a lot different than mariners of yesterday.” Crowley recently needed to lease some new vessels and found “there wasn’t much new in the way of crew comfort and keeping up with what modern culture offers right now and how people expect to live their lives,” said Bryan Nichols, senior director of business development and commercial operations with Crowley Engineering Services (previously Jensen Maritime). Staying with the tried-and-true of the past is not what Crowley envisions as the best way to retain crews for the long term. That’s why a primary focus is modernized workboat designs with an emphasis on crew comfort, “how the crew interacts with one another, with the vessel itself,” said Nichols. Understanding the comfort issue has been approached in several different ways, including conducting interviews with
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multiple workboat crews and sending Crowley engineers out on workboats for a couple of days at a time to understand the daily experiences crews go through. Also, Crowley has engaged noise consultants and brought in interior designers “to give us a complete fresh look inside the vessel to anyone stepping aboard,” said Nichols. Crowley has also gone to industries outside the marine world such as aerospace “to see how they have overcome the small space” issue. The work, which will first be on display with the launching of the eWolf, the all-electric harbor tug being built at Master Boat Builders in Coden, Ala., is aimed at giving “people their own personal space that can be uniquely updated for each person on the vessel,” said Nichols. Whereas a generation ago once the crew was on a boat they didn’t have much connection with friends and family, part of the comfort space Nichols refers to today includes charging ports and being able “to connect to the outside world via Wi-Fi and stay connected with everybody back home.” Attention has also been paid to the pilothouse and deck. Engineers and naval architects, Nichols said, weren’t the sole developers of the new pilothouse design. Captains were enlisted in a 3-D interactive design to develop an integrated bridge system with optimal lines of sight that allows the operator to “focus on what he needs to do to operate the vessel.” Down at the bow, the staple, based on input from tug operators, was pushed into the bulwarks to prevent someone from getting caught between the staple and the line going to a ship. Also, a step that’s traditionally been in the deck was eliminated. However, the most innovative feature is a rescue ladder built into the port and starboard sides of the tug, about amidwww.workboat.com • AUGUST 2022 • WorkBoat
Hockema Group
420’ Hockema Group-designed Frederick Paul will be the largest hopper dredge built in the U.S. when it’s launched in 2023.
