Offshore staff
LIMASSOL, Cyprus– SeaBird Exploration Plc has secured two new contracts.
The company has received a letter of award for a niche 3D survey in West Africa, with a total value of about $6.5 million. The survey is expected to start in 2Q 2019, with a total duration of about 80 days. The total duration includes associated vessel transit.
Due to fleet positioning and other contract opportunities, the company said it will time-charter theNordic Explorer for this survey and will also bid the Nordic Explorer for subsequent opportunities in the second half of 2019. In connection with the charter agreement, SeaBird will receive 9 km (6 mi) of ION DigiSTREAMER from the owners of the Nordic Explorer.
In addition, the company has secured a source contract for anOBN survey in the Gulf of Mexico. The contract has an expected duration of three weeks and will start in early April. SeaBird’s Harrier Explorer has been working on this survey since February 2019, under a previously announced contract. She will now be joined by the Osprey Explorer, which recently completed other work in the region, for a period of simultaneous source operations.
It also has agreed to a 21-day off-hire period for theVoyager Explorer related to a technical stop in January 2019.
The company said it is seeing increasing demand for its services within the source vessel, 2D, and niche 3D markets. In 2018, total duration on received tenders was up 52% compared to 2017, and it experienced a 40% increase in days on contract in the same period. Rates on new contracts across the three operating segments are as a result up 15-30% year on year.
The company added that it is evaluating opportunities for vessel capacity expansion. This includes an option to add theBOA Galatea and BOA Thalassa to the operational fleet, which are currently owned by BOA SBL AS, a subsidiary of BOA Offshore AS. The BOA Thalassa is currently contracted with EMGS ASA until September 2019, with options to extend for three times six months. SeaBird has received irrevocable acceptances from a majority of Boa SBL bondholders for a sale of the vessels based on an en bloc valuation of NOK185 million ($21.5 million).
In addition, the company said it is considering entering into other negotiated charter arrangements for capacity expansion at flexible terms. It emphasized that no binding decisions have been made regarding any capacity expansion at the current stage and it is evaluating the alternatives.
04/01/2019
