Offshore staff
HIXON, UK -- ALE has completed offshore and marine operations for an unnamed platform project in Azerbaijan.
The scope involved load-out of two jackets, weighing and jack-up of the topsides, strand jack skidding load-outs, ballasting and mooring, and offshore floatovers for two topsides.
ALE began the first stage of operations in July 2016 with the ballasting load-outs of the production and riser (PR) and the living quarters and utilities (QU) platform jackets, weighing respectively 13,977 t and 12,369 t.
Jacket constructor BOS Shelf commissioned the company to provide the full external ballast system and engineering, and the ballast system design and calculations.
The jackets were loaded-out onto the STB-1 launch barge, measuring 153 x 45 x 12 m (502 x 147 x 39 ft), using the client’s push/pull skidding system.
Next, ALE performed weighing and jack-up of the QU topsides for a separate client, deploying load cells to weigh the deck at 12,789 t and the Mega Jack system to jack-up the topsides 14.5 m (47.6 ft).
Subsequently the load-out frame was transferred under the topsides, followed by skidding load-out of the QU deck, now at 14,200 t, by means of 900-t strand jacks and ballasting the barge.
In addition, ALE supplied a large spread of mooring winches ranging in capacity from 20 t to 85 t.
Recently, the company completed floatover of the QU topsides using its own ballast system and mooring winches.
Matthew Hodgson, Engineering Manager for ALE - Offshore Services, said: “Our Offshore Services team, who are also contracted for the engineering and ballasting for the load-out and floatover operations, have designed and fabricated bespoke ballast piping to fit around pre-existing pipework on the barge, which will serve for all ballasting requirements for the entire project thus saving our clients time and money.”
The final phase involved the load-in of the load-out frame, followed by the weighing, jack-up, load-out and finally floatover operations of the PR topsides.
10/10/2017
