At the end of November, there was a serious fire in the engine room of the bremenports bucket excavator Bremerhaven - due to a technical defect, as the subsequent investigations revealed. It is now clear that repairing the now 45-year-old workboat is not justifiable in view of the cost and age of the bucket excavator.
Up to 2.5 million euros - if no further damage occurs during the shipyard stay: this is the assessment of an expert office commissioned specifically to determine the extent of the damage. However, the amount is only to be understood as a guideline and estimate - the repair costs could still increase due to potentially hidden details, according to the report. In addition, the ship would be out of service for at least a year either way - this is roughly the estimate for the repair time.
After extensive examination and consideration, a decision has now been made: The bucket excavator will be taken out of service due to the high repair costs - and the expected increase in maintenance costs and casting times in the future due to the ship's advanced age.
“We didn't take this decision lightly,” reports Henry Behrends, Head of Port Operations at bremenports, ”but anything else would not make economic sense, especially as the future dredging concept for Bremen and Bremerhaven agreed by the members of the Senate and the Port Committee provides for the workboat to be taken out of service one way or another. This is now happening about two years earlier than planned due to the fire.”
Ultimately, according to the dredging concept, water injection - or WI for short - will be used in future to maintain the water depths in the harbors. The advantage of this is that the deposits on the harbor floor are stirred up by working vessels equipped with appropriate water injection equipment, dissolve as sediment in the water and, at best, are transported back towards the North Sea at the next low tide. “With the Hol Blank and the Hol Deep, we have already been successfully operating two such working vessels for a long time - in the medium term, a third such vessel is to be added to further expand the WI area,” says Behrends.
In areas where conventional dredging is still required - such as in sluiced-off areas - a chartered work platform with a grab dredger - manned by colleagues from bremenports' dredging department - will be used instead of the bucket excavator at short notice. “In addition, as has been the case for years, we will also commission third-party companies if necessary,” explains Behrends. All in all, this overall solution is more economical than relying on repairing the bucket excavator, which was already very susceptible to maintenance. The failure of the bucket dredger does not mean any restrictions in terms of necessary dredging work in the ports for port residents and users: The water depth maintenance in the ports is still guaranteed.
The personnel who were previously deployed in connection with the bucket excavator are already being trained for future deployment on the WI workboats. “The dredging colleagues do not have to fear for their jobs as a result of the fire on the bucket dredger. On the contrary, we are glad that we have and can retain this skilled personnel in view of the situation on the labour market,” emphasizes Behrends. Now that the port department has also agreed to the technical assessment, the members of the port committee were also informed today about the decommissioning of the bucket dredger: The long-serving piece of equipment from the ports of Bremen will now be sold.
