Damen Shipyard Group is to start building its new Walk 2 Work vessel on speculation, which is designed to assist the offshore support vessel market by accommodating turbine maintenance crews at sea.
The 90m-long, 20m-wide Walk 2 Work vessel will provide onsite work facilities, accommodation for voyages of up to one month and will be equipped with a helicopter platform.
The 2,500t monohull vessel with bridge located amidships and daughter vessels features 500m² deck space, approximately 400m² internal storage space and a motion and heave compensating crane and gangway.
The vessel is expected to cruise at a maximum speed of 14k, accommodate 72 passengers and has an 80% accessibility gain in the Central North Sea Area.
Specially designed for the North Sea area of operation, the vessel will deliver greater turbine availability, less lost production and direct operation and maintenance costs against a higher profitability of the wind farm.
A significant reduction of accelerations of up to 30% has been achieved throughout the ship to provide optimal comfort for crew and passengers.
Damen has taken measures to reduce the vessels total cost of ownership focusing on an optimised design based on the right ocean conditions.
The transfer positioning system (TPS) allows for a safe transfer since it operates independently of the control systems for the dynamic positioning of the vessel.
Damen Shipyards, which has an annual turnover of €1.7bn, employs 8,000 people and delivers around 150 vessels and performs more than 1,000 repair jobs a year.
Image: Damen’s wind farm service vessel. Photo: courtesy of Damen Shipyard Group.
