Bibby WaveMaster 1 Launched at Damen Shipyards Galati
The Bibby WaveMaster 1, the first of Damen’s purpose-built Service Operations Vessels (SOV) with Walk-to-Work (W2W) capability, was officially launched at Damen Shipyards Galati in Romania on 24 March. When completed, Bibby Marine Services will deploy the vessel to support forthcoming offshore wind construction and O&M projects in the North Sea.
Bibby WaveMaster 1 is built specifically for the transfer and accommodation of offshore personnel and aims to maximise working time, technician comfort and safety. The design incorporates the philosophies of Damen’s E3 principle – Efficiency in operation, Environmentally friendly and Economically viable. Equipped with DYNPOS (AUTR) DP2, the 90m LOA vessel has a motion compensated access system (Walk-to-Work). During the construction process, Damen has continued to work closely with the client in customising the vessel in order to give it multi-sector versatility. This has included, for example, adjusting the design of the elevator to the W2W gangway. This now has six landings, meaning that technicians can directly access the gangway from the warehouse areas with a ‘stepless approach’. A helideck, daughter craft and CTV landings (with refueling) complement the vessel’s versatility. Also upgrading the vessel’s workrole flexibility, Damen has increased the POB to 90, from the 60 envisioned by the standard design.
Taking into account the trend for windfarms to go farther from the shore in more challenging seas, the customised design provides fast, safe and comfortable access to turbines, and at a lower cost, including in worst case scenario severe Central North Sea conditions. This results in a vessel capable of providing turbine access up to 3.1m Hs. The Damen SOV is able to remain at sea for periods of up to one month at a time. During the two-year design and build period, when Damen and Bibby worked very closely together, a lot of attention has been paid to crew comfort on board the vessel. For example, the 90m hull is longer than that of a conventional Platform Supply Vessel, this combined with the 20m beam and 4.6m draught, offers substantially reduced motions in every direction – resulting in significantly improved comfort on board. The aft ship has been adapted specifically to the tasks that the vessel is designed for, including stern to waves operations. The strong V-shape and the slender aft ship make these operations much more comfortable than on a standard PSV design. There are two large storage areas for containers and this has been adapted so the SOV can also hold high cube containers. Fuel efficiency is another key feature. The design includes a diesel-electric main propulsion system, which powers twin azimuth thrusters. Thanks to careful development, the vessel requires less installed power than a conventional PSV. This results from two factors – a symmetrical wind profile and use of a four split main switchboard.
Although primarily designed with offshore wind in mind in the case of the Bibby WaveMaster 1, the carefully considered design means that the vessel is capable of a much wider scope of work in a variety of offshore industries. A range of options are available including an additional deck crane with up to a 24t capacity, tanks arrangements suited to liquids such as glycols and low flashpoint liquids with separate delivery intakes, and facilities for dive support and ROV operations.