Cochin Shipyard announces mega block erection of the barge under construction and delivery of 16th Fast Patrol Vessel
The block erection works of the Deck Cargo / Launch Barge being built at CSL for National Petroleum Construction Company (NPCC) , Abu Dhabi commenced when a mega block was erected in the building dock, the company said in its press release.
The block weighing 140 Tonnes was erected using the giant gantry crane which is the skyline of Kochi city. This Deck Cargo/Launch Barge for NPCC is the 45 th Export order for CSL. This order was secured by Cochin Shipyard in January 2015 against an international tender under extremely competitive price and timelines.
Deck cargo/Launch barge is being built by Cochin Shipyard Ltd, for NPCC, which is an Engineering, Procurement and Construction Company that undertakes major construction activities at Offshore and Onshore Oil & Gas sector, worldwide. This is the second Launch Barge being built for NPCC by CSL. The first one was delivered to NPCC in 2003 and was the first export order undertaken by the yard.
The barge would be utilized at offshore industry, for loadout, transportation and launching of 15000T jackets and erection of 30000T topsides, and is equipped with seawater pumps to handle ballast requirements upto 26000cu.m per hour during operations. This is one of the largest barges of it s kind ever built in the world.
The barge has been designed with a very unique feature of downsizing the 180m long barge by removal of 40m from amid-ship, thereby providing an advantage of optimum utilisation of barge to handle smaller jackets and topsides of almost half the size. The barge fully designed in-house by CSL is being built under classification of American Bureau of shipping.
The other major event during the day was the delivery of ‘ICGS Arnvesh”, the sixteenth vessel in the series of twenty Fast Patrol Vessel under construction for the Indian Coast Guard. The vessel will be operated from the Coast Guard Station at Vizag. The ship was delivered more than 2 months ahead of the contractual timelines, thus winning the appreciation of the owners. The last ship in the series i.e the fifteenth ship ‘ICGS Arinjay” was also delivered 2 months ahe ad of schedule, i.e on 12 October 2015.
As per CSL’s contract with Indian Coast Guard the twentieth vessel of the order is to be delivered by March 2017. However, with the current pace of construction, Cochin Shipyard is targeting to accomplish the deli very of the last ship in 2016 itself, much ahead of schedule. The delivery of these ships , ahead of schedule, has gone a long way in securing the coast lines of the country without any delay. These Fast Patrol Vessels are primarily intended for patrolling withi n the Exclusive Economic Zone & Coastal Patrol, carrying out anti smuggling, anti piracy and search & rescue operations, and for fisheries protection & monitoring. They also have a secondary role of providing a communication link and escort coastal convoys, in times of hostilities and war.