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Almost without fanfare, one offshore vessel company has been dominating the building of crew/supply vessels and that company has not been Seacor Marine. The company is Crewboats, Inc., a small Chalmette, La. company that has built more than a half dozen 160-162-ft. vessels since 2003. Crewboats, Inc., sold all of its 135 ft. and up vessels plus a contract to build four more to Tidewater, Inc. in 2001. When the non-complete clause that was a part of the sales contract expired in 2003, Crewboats began building with a vengeance and needed two shipyards that specialize in these vessels to meet deliv- ery schedules. The lead shipyard in repopulating the company's crew/supply boat fleet has been Breaux's Bay Craft, Loreauville. In 2005, Breaux's Bay Craft delivered the Captain Preston P and the Lady Dakota, both 162-ft. by 30-ft. vessels. "Next year looks like a repeat of 2005 for us and Crewboats, Inc., with the Hori- zon Runner due out in January 2006 fol- lowed in April by a yet unnamed vessel," said Roy Breaux, Jr., president of the yard. The 162-ft. hull has become a standard for Breaux's Bay Craft, not just for Crew- boats, Inc. but for several other repeat cus- tomers as well. "The 162-ft. hull combines speed, maneuverability, load hauling capacity and economy of operation," Breaux added. The Lady Dakota is best described as a fast, heavy hauler. Propelled by a quartet of Caterpillar 3512 engines each rated at GREAT BOATS of 2005 The two shipyards of Edison Chouest Offshore (ECO), have been very busy for the last three years building a series of 280-ft. supply vessels, the largest in the industry. The vessels have a beam of 60-ft. and a hull depth of 24 ft., enabling them to carry large amounts of liquid mud, fuel oil, methanol in hull tanks and cargo on the rear deck. "At 4,811 deadweight tons capacity this is an outstanding vessel," said Roger White, senior vice president of the company. "We purpose-built these vessels for our customers who are supply- ing tension leg platforms and other struc- tures deep in the Gulf of Mexico," White added. Flexibility is a key design element in these vessels. "Often these 280-ft. vessels can supply multiple platforms, where it may take two or three separate smaller vessels to do the same job. The customer saves significant cost using one vessel rather than two or three," White believes. The latest vessel to be delivered to the Chouest fleet of 280-ft. supply vessels is the Christian Chouest that went on charter to Shell in November 2005. Earlier in the year the Dionne Chouest joined the Chouest fleet and went on charter in July 2005. Both of the 2005 deliveries are dif- ferent from the vessels delivered before them in that they have considerable advanced pilothouse electronics. In fact the entire look of the pilothouse is differ- ent. Instead of a confusing array of dials, switches and knobs mounted on a four ft. high console, the look is more streamlined with an array of seven monitors stretched out across the front of the pilothouse with other electronics on stations at a right angle to the monitors with two pilothouse chairs on moveable tracks. All controls are at the right or left hands of the pilots. Marine Technologies LLC, Mandeville, La., a division of ECO is responsible for the advance electronics and the layout of the pilothouse. At the rear station, visibility is even bet- ter with the windows extending from the ceiling to the floor and all electronics and other controls mounted along side of the pilot chairs again on moveable tracks. The power for this series of supply boats if from a pair of Caterpillar 3608 engines, each developing 3,600 hp. The engines also turn 1.2 MW shaft generators working off the Schottel gears. Two Caterpillar 3508 engines rated drive 910 kW generators for ship's power and a third Caterpillar 3508 powers the 1,200 HP drop-down bow thruster. The capacities of the Christian Chouest and all the vessels in this series is outstanding and include 303,000 gallons of fuel oil, 297,000 gal- lons of ballast water and over 15,000 bar- rels of liquid mud. Other capacities include 87,000 gallons of methanol and 11,000 cu. ft. of dry bulk in five tanks. All the vessels in this series are DP-2 rated. Christian Chouest: 280-ft. Supply Vessel Launch day for the 280-ft. Christian Chouest. Within weeks, the vessel will be sea trialed and ready to join Chouest's Gulf of Mexico fleet. The newer 280-ft. vessels have a completely redesigned pilothouse with monitors replacing the various switches, dials and levers that populate most wheelhouses. Lady Dakota: Crew/Supply Vessel 20 • MarineNews • December, 2005 The latest 162-ft. crew/supply boat for Crewboats, Inc. The Lady Dakota was delivered in September 05 and there are two additional vessels for this customer due from Breaux's Bay Craft in 2006. DECEMBER MN2005 3(17-24).qxd 12/5/2005 3:51 PM Page 20
