Norwegian shipyard to build IMR vessel for Nigeria’s Marine Platforms

Marine Platforms Limited (MPL), a Nigerian offshore oil and gas company, has contracted Norwegian shipyard, Havyard Ship Technology AS, to build a new Havyard 857 subsea inspection maintenance and repair (IMR) vessel for the company.

As a result, Norwegian shipyard in April signed an order with MacGregor, part of Cargotec, to supply two MacGregor offshore cranes to be installed on the new IMR vessel and used for diverse deep water operations in Nigerian coastline.

According to the contract, MacGregor is expected to supply one 250-ton MacGregor active heave-compensated (AHC) subsea crane and another 20-ton MacGregor AHC subsea crane to be delivered in July 2014 while the vessel is scheduled to be handed over to MPL in August the same year.

“The offshore market in west Africa is recognised worldwide as an area with very promising future prospects,” says Frode Grøvan, sales and marketing director for MacGregor Advanced Load Handling.

Grøvan said it is a significant advantage for his company to participate in the expansion into the West African region. He assured that the cranes will deliver reliable and proven load-handling technology to MPL.

Havyard has been developing its series of subsea vessel designs since 2005. This particular Havyard 857 for MPL will have a larger deck area than previous designs – comprising a main deck of 1,200m2 and a mezzanine deck of 225m2 – along with a larger offshore crane and an extra auxiliary crane.