Owners look beyond Middle East for growth opportunities

Towage companies operating throughout the Middle East are finding pockets of demand for their vessels from marine construction, new ports and offshore oil and gas operations. But fleet utilisation is impacted by the large volume of laid-up vessels in the region. This is creating an oversupply issue for owners, despite the high costs of reactivating unused tugs, says GAC vice president for marine operations Erland Ebbersten.

“The market is challenging as demand and supply are not in balance,” he explains. “There is considerable oversupply and the industry is talking about the cost of reactivating vessels if they are laid up too long.”

Reactivation requirements involve replacing propulsion and pipework on vessels. Despite reactivation costs and time, owners are reluctant to scrap laid up tugs and anchor handlers.

Instead, GAC is focused on keeping fleet utilisation high by ensuring its tugs and anchor handlers are ready to support marine construction and oilfield projects. It operates a fleet of nine tugs, with power ranging from 560 kW to 5,960 kW and bollard pulls of 10-50 tonnes.

Its tugs are used for general towage, barge handling, supporting dredging operations, ship berthing, canal transit and towing third-party equipment.

GAC operates eight barges in the region, ranging from 1,200 dwt to 8,000 dwt used for heavy lift roro operations, carrying coated pipe, and material for offshore and marine construction.

GAC also operates five anchor handling tugs, two anchor handling tug and supply and seven crew supply vessels in the Middle East.

“Our fleet is mostly anchor handlers and tugs for towage,” says Mr Ebbersten. “They move barges around for engineering contractors for marine construction and oilfield operations, for land reclamation projects, building harbour infrastructure and for constructing oil and gas production islands.”

This fleet operates in Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain and occasionally in Qatar. GAC is working to extend its operations. “We are looking to expand into Egypt where there are developments in the Red Sea, and on the Saudi Arabia side, for tug and barge operations,” says Mr Ebbersten. “We are considering moving existing resources and perhaps new ones.” GAC also operates anchor handling tugs in the Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan sectors of the Caspian Sea.

“We clean the hulls with divers or put these vessels into our own drydock where we can do a better job”

An important requirement for maintaining high utilisation is cleaning the hulls of its marine assets, says Mr Ebbersten. “We need to manage marine growth on our vessels that accumulates if vessels stand still, even for just one month.” If this growth remains unchecked it can spread to sea chests “which can mean problems with the engines” he explains. Therefore, intervention is required before vessels can return to work. “We clean the hulls with divers or put these vessels into our own drydock where we can do a better job,” says Mr Ebbersten.

GAC operates its own shipyard in Abu Dhabi for drydockings and newbuilding projects. It is currently building an anchor handling tug that could have up to 150 tonnes of bollard pull and be deployed in west Africa from 2021.

“We employ more people and resources where it is needed. They can work on the newbuilding,” says Mr Ebbersten. “When one of our vessels comes into the shipyard for routine drydocking, workers will go on to that. When there is slack in drydocking work, these workers will return to the newbuilding.”

GAC also operates a fleet of supply and towage vessels in Sri Lanka. This includes six crew and supply vessels, and four workboats. “We have vessels there for different types of activity including supplying ships from Goa and in the winter season there are many distress calls, so there is salvage and emergency towage,” says Mr Ebbersten.

GAC is looking to expand these operations into India. “We might add a vessel to the fleet to break into this market,” he explains. “It would be purchased on the secondhand market as there are vessels available at good prices. All it would need is a new coat of paint and it would be ready.”

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GAC Middle East fleet

Tugs >2,900 kW: 3

Tugs 750-2,900 kW: 4

Tugs <750 kW: 2

Crew boats: 7

Anchor handling tugs: 5

AHTS: 2

Barges >6,000 dwt: 4

Barges <6,000 dwt: 4

Sri Lanka supply boats: 6

Sri Lanka workboats: 4

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Indeed, there are plenty of salvage requirements in the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman, particularly with increasing attacks on tankers in the region. In June, Royal Boskalis Westminster’s Smit Salvage was appointed as salvor for two tankers – Front Altair and Kokuka Courageous – that were damaged in unexplained attacks.

Frontline’s LR2 product carrier Front Altair suffered from an explosion and fire and Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM)-managed methanol carrier Kokuka Courageous was holed by explosions in separate incidents near the Strait of Hormuz, in Oman waters, but near Iranian territory.

Damen-built tug, EMAR Offshore Services’ E-Two was en route from India to Fujairah when it helped extinguish the fire on Front Altair on 13 June. Utility vessel Coastal Ace was en route from Singapore to Al Hamriya, UAE, when it steamed to assist Kokuka Courageous.

By 16 June, Smit Salvage had mobilised towing tug, Aquila, and two other vessels to tow Front Altair to the Fujairah-Khor Fakkan area. Kokuka Courageous was also towed to safety.

These incidents came after four other tankers were attacked off the coast of Fujairah in May, demonstrating the rising need for salvage operations in the region.

Resolve Marine Group was also busy in Oman in the first four months of this year, salvaging bulk cement carrier Raysut II. This vessel lost steering after leaving the port of Salalah and grounded on wildlife-rich Al-Fazayah Beach in Oman in May 2018.

In November 2018, Resolve Marine was contracted to refloat the wreck and tow it to a safe port for cargo unloading and demolition. Resolve mobilised salvage and wreck removal tug Resolve Monarch and crane barge RMG 1000 from Singapore. In February, Resolve patched up the wreck and refloated it with the cargo on board. The wreck was towed to the port of Salalah, where most of the cargo was discharged. These operations were completed on 11 April.