Damen Shipyards has delivered another CSD500 cutter suction dredger to Nigeria which will perform maintenance duties in and around the harbours of Port Harcourt.
The stationary dredger was assembled on the beach and pushed into the sea over a ramp following delivery. Because Damen cutter suction dredgers are made from a modular design, they are easy to transport and simple to assemble when they reach their destination.
In this case, the crew assembled the dredger along with a Damen field service engineer using hoisting gear available locally.
Once assembled, with the main pontoon placed on a wooden ramp, the dredger was pushed into the sea by two bull dozers assisted by a tug pulling the other end. The dredge design allows for this type of launching and the vessel can be deployed in pretty most anywhere.
The CSD500 will perform maintenance duties at a dredging depth of up to 16m in the wider port area. The dredge pump has a mixture capacity of 4.000 m³/h and has a respectable swing width of 40m.
The dredger was able to start work immediately as the Damen delivery included floating pipe line, land based pipe line, a complete spares package and two weeks of crew training by Damen field service engineers.
Damen said its focus on standardisation, modular construction and keeping vessels in stock leads to shorter delivery times, lower ‘total cost of ownership’, high resale value and more reliable performance.
By Anne-Marie Causer
