Page 77: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (April 2012)

Cargotec AHC Offshore Cranes for Volstad Following on from an order in April last year, Cargotec has won a contract for two active heave- compensated (AHC) offshore cranes from the privately-owned Norwegian specialist operator, Vol- stad Maritime. The two cranes, a 250-ton MacGregor AHC subsea crane and a 15-ton MacGregor AHC offshore crane, will be fitted to Volstad's new offshore construction vessel (OCV) on order at Bergen Group Fosen shipyard in Norway. The vessel (hull 90) is scheduled for delivery in August 2013, and following this, it will be chartered for subsea intervention services. This con- tract follows an identical one that was secured by Cargotec in April last year for Volstad's hull 89, which is due for delivery from the yard in July this year. Like its sistership, Volstad's latest OCV is an ST-259-CD design from Norwegian consultants, Skipsteknisk, and is 125m long and 25m wide. The vessel is designed to the highest environmental standards and Clean Design require- ments. It will be classed to Ice-1A.April 2012www.marinelink.com 73Crane Accident Investigation CompleteKvaerner ASA last month concluded its internal investigation following a serious crane accident at its Verdal yard February 8, 2012. The report, which was presented to the Police and the Norwegian Labor In- spection Authority, examines the accident in detail, and finds that the accident could have been avoided if more safety barriers had been in place, been more precise and had been followed. The construction and related operations in conjunction with the production of large jacket structures at Kvaerner's yard at Verdal involve lifting operations and work at height. The accident occurred when a crawler crane with a boom of 51.8m and a jib of 30m, and outfitted with a personnel basket was provided to perform the final inspec- tion of a windmill jacket. The crane driver and a signal man were controlling the crane operation. The sig- nal man was working from the personnel basket. To enable inspection on the sea side of the jacket the jib was positioned over the top of the jacket. As the boom was gradually lowered, the jib came in contact with the railing at the top of the jacket. The jib collapsed in two steps, first when the inner part of the jib made contact with the inner top part of the jacket, and then again when the jib hit the outer part of the jacket. The jib collapsed and caused the wire suspending the basket to break at the jib tip. The basket with personnel, all secured by safety harness at- tached to the basket, fell to the barge deck. When the jib made contact with the jacket structure, the bas- ket was approximately 32m above the barge deck. The first jib-collapse brought the basket down by 9m, and the second collapse by another 8m. The wire broke as the basket was approximately 15m above the barge deck. The basket hit the jacket structure during the fall. All three persons in the basket were severely injured as a consequence of the fall.