Vale SA (VALE5), the world’s second-largest mining company, plans to change designs for some of its new iron-ore ships, the biggest ever built, to include safe rooms protecting crews against hijackings by Somali pirates, Bloomberg reports. Some ships will have purpose-built emergency strongrooms, known as citadels, where crews can await rescue if pirates board the vessels, Peter Kavanagh, company security officer for Rio de Janeiro-based Vale, said on the sidelines of a Hanson Wade conference in Hamburg yesterday. Vale is the world’s biggest producer of iron ore, a steelmaking raw material.
Pirate attacks in the Gulf of Aden, the Red Sea and off Somalia, an area larger than Europe, jumped almost fivefold between 2007 and 2011 to a record 236, according to the London- based International Maritime Bureau. Ship owners need to strengthen citadels on existing vessels because pirates can too often shoot through their doors and windows, Kavanagh said.
“We’re the only company I know of that’s doing it,” he said. “I don’t think a lot of people are there yet. It’s too easy to call something a citadel when it really isn’t.”
Vale, which already owns and operates 52 vessels, is building 35 of the world’s biggest iron-ore carriers, of which it will own 18. The redesign will apply to those company-owned vessels yet to be delivered, according to Kavanagh. Some of the ships cross the Indian Ocean to Oman to deliver the raw material to a pelletizing plant, he said.
Food, Medicine
The strongrooms, recommended under industry guidelines, will have independent satellite communication as well as food and medicine for three days, according to Kavanagh. They also will enable crews to control ships, he said.
Diverting ships from risky areas lengthened journey times by three days, adding $70,000 a day in extra fuel costs, or about 78 percent of the additional security expense, he said. Vale used armed guards on all vessels sailing to Oman since July, Kavanagh said.
There are about 5,000 pirates operating in the region, with about 20 percent “taken out of the game” through counter- piracy operations, Phil Haslam, chief of staff of the European Union Naval Force Somalia, said at the same event.
The increased naval interventions and better on-board security helped cut first-quarter attacks by Somali pirates to 43 from 97 a year earlier, the IMB said April 23.
Vale ranks second among miners by market value after BHP Billiton Ltd.
Pirate attacks in the Gulf of Aden, the Red Sea and off Somalia, an area larger than Europe, jumped almost fivefold between 2007 and 2011 to a record 236, according to the London- based International Maritime Bureau. Ship owners need to strengthen citadels on existing vessels because pirates can too often shoot through their doors and windows, Kavanagh said.
“We’re the only company I know of that’s doing it,” he said. “I don’t think a lot of people are there yet. It’s too easy to call something a citadel when it really isn’t.”
Vale, which already owns and operates 52 vessels, is building 35 of the world’s biggest iron-ore carriers, of which it will own 18. The redesign will apply to those company-owned vessels yet to be delivered, according to Kavanagh. Some of the ships cross the Indian Ocean to Oman to deliver the raw material to a pelletizing plant, he said.
Food, Medicine
The strongrooms, recommended under industry guidelines, will have independent satellite communication as well as food and medicine for three days, according to Kavanagh. They also will enable crews to control ships, he said.
Diverting ships from risky areas lengthened journey times by three days, adding $70,000 a day in extra fuel costs, or about 78 percent of the additional security expense, he said. Vale used armed guards on all vessels sailing to Oman since July, Kavanagh said.
There are about 5,000 pirates operating in the region, with about 20 percent “taken out of the game” through counter- piracy operations, Phil Haslam, chief of staff of the European Union Naval Force Somalia, said at the same event.
The increased naval interventions and better on-board security helped cut first-quarter attacks by Somali pirates to 43 from 97 a year earlier, the IMB said April 23.
Vale ranks second among miners by market value after BHP Billiton Ltd.