Thursday, June 25, 2009
Cloudy outlook for Dapeng Sun
Singapore: She was delivered six months late with reports of certain lingering malfunctions and now they have come home to roost. China’s first domestically built LNG carrier, Dapeng Sun, built at Hudong-Zhonghua to much fanfare for China LNG Shipping Holdings (CLNG), a joint venture company by China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC), COSCO and China Merchants Holdings Co. (CMHC), has headed to Singapore for urgent repairs just 14 months after she was completed. Classed by ABS, the ship is now at Sembawang Shipyard with reported issues regarding contamination of the bearing oil for the stern tube.
The ship is set to return to normal duties, shifting gas from Australia to southern China, in early July. Hudong-Zhonghua is currently engaged in building a further five similar 147,000 cu m LNG ships for the same owner. The yard, one of China's elite shipbuilding facilities, has been plagued with production issues of late. Last year the collapse of a 600t gantry crane (pictured) killed a number of workers and has nixed the use of a drydock for more than a year. [24/06/09]
