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Back to 24/2008
Herning pleased with Chinese shipyard
The Ruth Theresa on a summer day in the port of Fredericia
Photo: Bent Mikkelsen.
The Chinese shipbuilder Nantong Mindge Heavy Industry Ltd in the city of Tongzhou, China, will be using a lot of red paint in 2008.
The red paint will be used on a number of ships under construction for Danish Herning Shipping A/S and associates. The delivery of ships from the shipyard started in February and April with the 8,000 dwt product tanker pair Ditte Theresa and Ruth Theresa. In the first week of December they were followed by the first of four 11,000 dwt tankers.
The Ditte Theresa and Ruth Theresa are the first in a series of ten almost identical ships for delivery in the coming years. In fact, the two ships were the very first ones from the Chinese shipyard, which was started from scratch by two Chinese businessmen; one with a lot of cash and one with control over a workforce of 4,000 people with experience in the work at a shipyard as most of them were hired out to a Japanese shipyard.
“It was a bit of an experiment at the beginning”, explains Tom Bach Mortensen, Technical Manager of Herning Shipping A/S. “Since then it has been a most impressive experience working with the Chinese. They have improved the standard of their work daily. We also know for a fact that the managing director of the shipyard has told the employees again and again that they have to listen very carefully to the owner’s representative and make sure to live up to their standards. The purpose is of course to learn the level of good western standards.”
“Even if we have taken delivery of the very first ships from this shipyard, the standards have been to our satisfaction and the deliveries even almost on schedule”, says Tom Bach Mortensen.
Will to succeed
“And they have the will to succeed. At some point we were a little unsatisfied with the progress in coating one of the vessels and asked for more painters the following day in order to finish the painting. Again we were impressed. The next morning an additional 90 painters were ready for the job.”
“The next morning
an additional 90 painters
were ready for the job.”
The two first units, the Ditte Theresa and Ruth Theresa, will be two specials in the fleet of ten vessels. The difference between the two vessels and the rest of the series is the installation of cargo pumps. The Ditte Theresa and Ruth Theresa are fitted with a central pump room with four screw pumps in a sort of old-fashioned installation. The rest of the ships in the same series will be fitted with deepwell pumps. The ships are capable of carrying four grades in both versions. The tankers are coated with Marine Line coating for carrying IMO 2 cargoes.
Stepping up in size
The delivery of the two Chinese sisters was one of the first steps up in size of tankers in the fleet. Until the delivery of the Ditte Theresa Herning Shipping had only worked in the segment around 8,000 dwt by using chartered tonnage. The two – and the rest of the series – were ordered some years ago, and shortly afterwards some units in this size were taken on timecharter. Herning Shipping is going further up in size as the deliveries of the series of 11,000 dwt tankers are in progress. The first ship in the Nantong-series will be the Charlotte Theresa, which was delivered on December 5, taking off for loading in the Far East in a really tight market with only few cargoes available en route to Europe. However, the Charlotte Theresa will arrive at Rotterdam around January 10, 2009, and join the Herning fleet for distribution in Northern Europe.
Few oldies left
Herning Shipping has a relatively young fleet, the oldest vessel being the Vitta Theresa, which was delivered in 1991. It is at present flying the Singapore flag and is owned by Herning’s subsidiary in Singapore. The vessel will remain in the fleet as it suits well the domestic distribution for the oil majors rather well.
Earlier this year Herning Shipping disposed of the oldest vessel, the Annelise Theresa, a semi-sister to the Vitta Theresa. The tanker was built in 1990 in Holland and was delivered in October to a Greek buyer in Piraeus. The Birthe Theresa, flying the Isle of Man flag, built in 1995, has been put up for sale. Also the Grete Theresa from 1996 is spoiling the average age, but that tanker is out of the ordinary as it has been on charter to one of the oil majors, serving the Fiji Islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, almost as far away from Herning as possible. The rest of the Herning vessels’ building years of build range from 1998 to the present.
Bent Mikkelsen. Editor, Denmark.
Latest update 19-12-2008
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No 24/2008
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2008