Seaway 7’s heavy-lift vessel Alfa Lift is will not be operational on projects during 2022, the company’s CEO Stuart Fitzgerald informed. The construction of the vessel continued through 2021 with commissioning of marine systems progressing as expected. The vessel departed for sea trials in early January 2022.

To remind, an incident involving the folding A-frame on the main crane on the heavy-lift vessel Alfa Lift occurred during the construction in October. At the time Seaway 7 noted that it is too early to indicate if this actually is the case and whether it will have any impact on the delivery schedule of the vessel.

However, in the company’s annual report, Fitzgerald said that the vessel will not be operational on projects during 2022. As a result of key supplier delays, the final installation, testing and commissioning of the mission equipment for the upending and lowering of monopiles is expected to represent the critical path to vessel delivery and readiness for operations.

Following the incident at the China Merchants Heavy Industry (CMHI) shipyard in Jiangsu, China, the A-frame has been removed from the vessel, inspected with no design deficiencies identified from root cause investigations. Crane is currently under repair at the yard, with repairs expected to be completed during the second half of 2022.

“We do not expect the vessel will be operational on projects during 2022. A contingency scenario is activated which utilises Seaway Strashnov to progress the committed work on the Dogger Bank A project in the second half of 2022,” Fitzgerald said.

The shipbuilding contract for Seaway Ventus, the group’s first wind turbine installation vessel continues in the detailed design phase – all main equipment has been selected and first steel cutting occurred in November 2021.

Delivery is scheduled for mid-2023 with the vessel anticipated to the start in first half of 2024 on Ørsted’s Borkum Riffgrund 3 and Gode Wind 3 in Germany.