MAREK GRZYBOWSKI write to ” Blue Economy ” Nauta – docks full of ships
Shipyard workers work in docks and halls at full productivity in Nauta, despite the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2020 shipyard workers from Gdynia focus on ship repairs and ship conversions.
The yard has about 19.7 hectares of newly acquired area of former Stocznia Gdynia S.A. Nauta has one 380 – metre – by – 70 – metre dry dock and four floating docks with lifting capacity ranging from 1,200 to 12,000 tonnes and has about 2,900 lineal metres of berthing with all the cranes required. It is fully equipped to carry out most advanced ship repairs and conversions to the ship owners requirements and demands.
“2019 was a very dynamic year in the production and shiprepair” says Adam Potrykus, President of the Board of Stocznia Remontowa NAUTA S.A. and adds: “We finished production in Gdansk, where we produced fishing vessels. We have a lot of work on ships in Gdynia. These are ship repairs and reconstruction”.
As I am writing this article, more ships enter the shipyard. “MS Valentina, a container ship (179 m long, capacity 1875 TEU) built in 2007, sailing under the flag of Portugal, an oil products tanker MS Challenge Passage (180 m ling, 48658 DWT), built in 2005 and sailing under the Panama flag, and a bulk carrier MS Eider (190 m long, 29859 DWT), built in 2010 and is sailing under the Antigua Barbuda flag,“ informs Jarosław Staluszka, Commercial Manager (repairs and conversions) of Nauta.
Star and Amber. Nauta Shipyard employees and engineers focus on repairs and conversions. New ship constructions are also underway. At the request of the shipowner from Scotland, a fully equipped trawler was built at the New Construction Plant, which sailed from the shipyard under the name Ocean Star. Mewstead (Fraserburgh) LLP contracted a ship 87 m long and 18 m wide. This is the most effective fishing vessel in its class in the world. Ocean Star has a 7,000 kW engine that works with two manoeuvring thrusters. As a result, the ship has a very good maneuverability while trawling nets. A total of 2.5 thousand of fish can be transported in 13 holds of the pelagic trawler. Ocean Star was designed by Wärtsilä Ship Design, and the ship was built under the supervision of DNV GL.
Nauta also built a partially equipped RAV trawler (means in English Amber). This is a project for the Karstensens Skibsvaerft AS shipyard. Nauta built over 15 vessels for this Danish shipyard. RAV is a fishing vessel 78 m long and 15 m wide. The trawler is ice class DnV + 1A1 Fishing Vessel Ice E0 TMON. The ship’s home port is Trondheim. „The ship will be fishing in the North Sea, mainly off the coast of Norway, Ireland and Denmark,” said Knud Degn Karstensen, Managing Director of Karstenesen Shipyard during the launch of the vessel. Shipyard workers from Nauta also produced a partially equipped Cetus fishing trawler 65 m long and 14 m wide. The vessel was equipped with fishing equipment and nets at Fitjar Mekaniske Verksted. The fishing vessel will operate by a shipowner with the same name—Cetus A.S., Norwegian company.
Conversions. “IMO regulations—the International Maritime Organization—have significantly increased the demand for ship conversions, assembly of scrubbers and ballast water purification equipment,“ says President Potrykus. It revived the offshore and naval ship market. Scrubbers were installed on six merchant ships and Ballast Water Treatment System retrofit on 11 bulk carriers and tankers were installed last year. We also note increased interest in ship repairs in Poland during a pandemic coming from customers from the Far East. For example, the system was installed on a 183 m long tanker MT Forres Park managed by Executive SM, Singapore. „We completed 123 renovations and conversions on civilian vessels in 2019,” informs Jarosław Staluszka. The modernization of the Construction Support Vessel consisted of installing batteries in the containers. They are charged by the ship’s generators. Now it is a hybrid ship. It will also be able to act as an electric ship. Nauta carried out the extension and modernization of two fishing vessels for an Icelandic customer, in addition to the repairs of fishing trawlers.
„We have successfully rebuilt two offshore vessels into a patrol unit for the Norwegian Coast Guard,” says President Potrykus. The shipyard from Gdynia deals with the construction of new ships and modernization of ships for the Polish navy and navies of other countries for many years. The innovative project is a ship for the Royal Swedish Navy. Installation of systems and equipping the ship is carried out in Gdynia. The ship for Sweden will be completed at the Saab Kockums shipyard in Karlskrona. She will enter service in Sweden as HSwMS Artemis.
„Oliver Hazard Perry, ORP Gen. K. Pulaski and ORP Gen. T. Kościuszko (135.6 m long and almost 14 m wide) were repaired in the Nauta shipyard. We can carry out repairs of large ships by renting a large dry SD I dock,” says Roman Drywa from Nauta, who shows me around the shipyard. The longest swinging tanker MT Grena in the history of the shipyard (277 m long and 46 m wide) was renovated in the longest SDII dock. Class repairs of Greek LPG tankers: Gas Cathar (119 m long) and Gas Myth about 100 m long) on large floating docks were carried out. Reconstruction of the Norwegian offshore Viking Neptun, with a length of 146.6 m and a width of 34.6 m was made here as well as periodic repair of the ship.
The shipyard has already carried out several major repairs including passenger ferries in the first months of this year. The CRACOVIA ferry (length—180 m, width— 24.3 m) from Polish Baltic Shipping and runs on the Świnoujście-Ystad route and the ROMANTIKA ferry (192.9 m long and 35.2 m wide) from TALLIK from Estonia have already left the shipyard. This year Nauta shipyard started with a good order portfolio, which may increase with the transfer of orders from other world shipyards to Poland.
Text and photos: Marek Grzybowski, Nauta
