Recently offshore access provider Ampelmann and Acta Marine performed a successful test with an electric L-type walk-to-work gangway on board Acta Marine’s latest addition to the fleet, the Coastal Crown.
In a joint effort, the companies have proven the ability to transfer personnel to a boat landing on offshore assets from a utility vessel. Jeroen Tol, Lead Feasibility Engineer with Ampelmann says: “Mobilization of the system was completed on board within nine hours, which makes the deployment opportunities for this system very flexible.” Acta Marine’s commercial manager Bert de Ruiter adds: “We see a range of offshore activities where this combination could be economical, think about oil changes on wind turbines or access to oil & gas installations which are too far offshore to be within the working range of CTV’s. This solution is quite literally ‘bridging the gap’ between CTV’s and larger and more expensive SOV’s.”
The Ampelmann L-type system is able to compensate vessel motions in in sea states up to 2 meters significant wave height. During the trials, the sea state was over 1,5 m Hs. “As part of these trials, we were able to test the operational efficiency of the L-type in combination with a relatively small vessel in North Sea conditions,” says Tol. This trial has also shown us that the mobilization and demobilization of our system can be completed in a matter of hours, rather than days.” The relative quick and simple placing of the system on board adds value to offshore service companies who need access for their personnel to offshore assets. “The quick turnaround time makes this option attractive for offshore service companies with limited tasks or scope of work to be done offshore,” Tol concludes.
The Coastal Crown, is a multicat-type vessel that can accommodate up to 12 industrial personnel, next to its 6 crew members. The vessel has DP2 capabilities and has hybrid propulsion, which significantly reduces its fuel consumption compared to similar vessels. With this trial, Acta Marine and Ampelmann have proven that this multicat – L-type combination is a cost-effective option as mini-SOV for spot jobs and short Walk2Work campaigns.
The multicat – L-type combination is currently available for charter, subject to availability.
