European Shipyard Week attracts attention

For the second time, European shipyards and related companies opened their doors for European Shipyard Week to advertise their high-tech products and processes and promote a wide range of career opportunities.

Open door days at many companies, universities, research centres, museums and other institutions, special presentations for school classes and artistic performances at the opening event in the Netherlands formed part of the program. The promotion attracted thousands of school leavers, young graduates, job seekers and other interested visitors to participate. High-ranking speakers of the European Commission, the European Parliament and representatives of Europe's shipbuilding regions, attended the opening conference in Brussels on April 2. The first Shipyard Week, launched two years ago, resulted in increased recruitment numbers in maritime universities and companies. Nevertheless, the shipbuilding and ship repair industry still experience a growing shortage of engineers and skilled workers. Due to growing business as well as the age profile of the current workforce, European shipyards will require a further increase in recruitment numbers. This triggered the decision to organize the shipyard week on a biannual basis.
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Higher fuel costs buoy demand for ships: Seaspan

The practice of "slow steaming" - running ships at lower speeds to conserve pricey fuel - is increasing demand for container ships on global trade routes, Seaspan Corp. chief executive officer Gerry Wang said.

Because customers still want goods delivered on the same schedule, slow-steaming means more ships are required to deliver the same amount of goods - so a shipping line, through redeployment, might run nine ships on an Asia-Europe route that used to operate with eight, he said. Seaspan, which is incorporated in the Marshall Islands and has executive offices in Hong Kong and Vancouver, leases container ships to major shipping lines. Slow-steaming, along with increased Asia-Europe container traffic, is driving container ship demand and makes a potential glut of big new ships less likely, Mr. Wang said on a conference call. "I'm not 100-per-cent sure that even with all the big ships coming on in 2009 that there will be oversupply," he said. Shipping lines have in recent years ordered more than 100 post-Panamax (too big to fit through the Panama Canal) vessels, raising speculation of a glut of container ships. The company reported a first-quarter loss of $37.7-million (U.S.) or 65 cents a share on sales of $54.2-million for the three months ended March 31, compared with a profit of $14.7-million or 31 cents a share on sales of $41.2-million for the same period the previous year. Seaspan reported "normalized" earnings, which exclude non-cash losses from interest rate swap agreements, of 28 cents a share, a penny off an analysts' consensus estimate of 29 cents. The company said it is redeploying ships to Asia-Europe routes as that traffic picks up and Asia-North American shipments soften. Asia-Europe traffic is estimated to have grown by 17 per cent last year compared with 6.9-per-cent increase in Asia-North America cargo.

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High-tech pirates are no romantic figures

A French yacht. A Japanese tanker. A Spanish fishing boat. After several years of decline, pirates are striking with increasing frequency on the high seas.

Attacks in the first three months of this year were up 20 percent compared with the same period in 2007, analysts say. Last year saw more pirate attacks than the year before. And although the motive is still money, today's pirates are a far cry from the eye-patched, peg-legged swashbucklers of Hollywood. "The only thing today's pirates have in common with the romantic vision people have of pirates is that they are ruthless criminals who exploit very vulnerable people at sea," said Pottengal Mukundan of the International Maritime Bureau, which monitors shipping crime. Today's maritime muggers don night-vision goggles, carry rocket launchers and navigate with global positioning devices. With the ransoms they collect, pirates can earn up to $40,000 a year, analysts say. That's a fortune for someone from an impoverished country. A spate of well-publicized attacks this month has cast the problem in sharp relief. On April 4, suspected Somali pirates seized a French luxury yacht and held its crew of 30 for a week. Then, in a scene straight out of a Hollywood movie, French troops chased the hijackers into the desert before the hijackers could make off with the reported $2 million in ransom. Last week, suspected pirates shot at a Japanese tanker in the waters off the Horn of Africa. Assailants have also attacked ships carrying food and relief supplies to war-torn regions.
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Seacor continues to build monohulls

Despite the success of their catamaran crewboats, US-based Seacor Marine continues to build their conventional crewboats.

Hull 464, to be named ‘Alice G. McCall', is currently building at Gulf Craft in Louisiana, to be delivered in August of this year. Two more conventional vessels will follow the 57.9- by 10.4-metre boat in 2009 and 2010. Five 1,342kW Cummins KTA50-M2 main engines for a total of 6,711kW will power the DP2-classed ‘Alice G. McCall'. Gears will be Twin Disc MG-6848 with 2.93:1 reduction turning four-blade Nibral propellers on five-inch shafts. The boat will have three independent rudders. A Cummins QSM11 engine will power the boat's Thrustmaster azimuthing bow thruster. An additional Cummins QSM11 will drive the two tunnel bow thrusters. The vessel's two 135kW gensets will each be powered by Cummins 6 CTA engines, as will the bulk compressor drive. Maximum speed will be 26 knots at 1,900RPM with fuel consumption at 1,590 litres per hour. Cruising speed will be 23 knots at 1,800RPM and 1,173 litres per hour fuel consumption. At the economy speed of 20 knots and 1,600RPM fuel consumption drops to 984 litres per hour.

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Al-Jurf field shuts down

Mabruk Oil Operations, a subsidiary of Total, has temporarily shut down production on the Al-Jurf field offshore Libya.

During drilling operations on the B18 gas injection well, a deviation occurred in the well trajectory, damaging the production pipe of adjacent well B12. For safety and security, all platform wells have been shut down and a team of specialists has been dispatched to evaluate and rectify the problem. Total reports no injuries or environmental damage. The Al-Jurf field is a wellhead platform that produces to an anchored floating production storage and offloading vessel around three kilometers (1.8 miles) away in water depths of around nine meters (29 ft). Production capacity of the field is around 45,000 b/d. Mabruk Oil Operations is the operator of the field, and Total holds a 37.5 percent working interest.

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Wärtsilä enters new service category - acquires Danish steam boiler service company

Wärtsilä has acquired the Danish company International Combustion Engineering A/S (I.C.E.).

I.C.E. specializes in project engineering and the service and repair of steam boilers and ancillary burner systems. The company has its headquarters in Aalborg, Denmark. The acquisition of I.C.E. will expand Wärtsilä’s service offering into the new category of boiler services. This new service category will further improve Wärtsilä’s competitiveness as a leading total services provider. I.C.E. has a strong market position, particularly with merchant vessels, while its major customers are shipping companies around the world. The company also has a trading division that supplies spare parts for boiler and burner systems. Furthermore, I.C.E. has the potential for strong global growth, and for expansion into segments such as offshore, cruise & ferry and special vessels, as well as to non-marine related industrial and land based power plant applications. The company’s annual net sales amounted to 46,8 million Danish crowns (EUR 6.3 million) in 2007. “I.C.E.’s excellent know-how of boiler services is a very welcome addition to Wärtsilä’s service offering. The acquisition will further expand Wärtsilä’s competitiveness and position as the number one global service provider”, says Mr Tage Blomberg, Group Vice President, Wärtsilä Services.

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Maersk Line wins “Best Shipping Line – Asia-Europe” and “Best Global Shipping Line”

Maersk Line, the core liner activity of the A.P. Moller – Maersk Group emerged winner of the “Best Shipping Line - Asia-Europe” Award for the 21st consecutive year at the 22nd Asian Freight and Supply Chain Awards (AFSCA).

Maersk Line also clinched the coveted “Best Global Shipping Line” Award for the 15th year running at the AFSCA ceremony held in Singapore. The awards are a reflection of the comprehensive and reliable end-to-end transportation solutions that Maersk Line offers to customers through its global service network. The Maersk Line fleet consists of more than 500 container vessels with a capacity of more than 1.7 million TEUs. Through a network of its own offices and third party agents in more than 125 countries, Maersk Line continues to provide consistent and high-quality service to customers worldwide. As winner of the “Best Shipping Line – Asia-Europe” Award, Maersk Line has eleven extensive strings on the Asia-Europe route, of which the latest Asia-Europe 11 or AE11 route was introduced to support shipments from Asia to Spain. Restructuring of the Asia-Europe routes has also brought enhanced coverage of markets in the Eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea. Judging criteria for the two Awards included schedule reliability, efficient customer service, service network comprehensiveness, competitive pricing and information technology. The winners were voted by the readers of Cargonews Asia and the results audited by Ernst & Young. The 22nd AFSCA was held at the Pan Pacific Hotel in Singapore and marks one of the longest standing and most renowned maritime awards in Asia.

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