On its maiden voyage, the company’s latest new building MV ‘Lone’ performed SAL’s heaviest lift ever. With its lifting capacity of 2 x 1,000t SWL the vessel loaded 8 reactors weighing up to 1,719t and measuring 45m x 8m x 8m.

As part of the RPLC Deep Conversion Project Phase II in Venezuela these massive reactors were manufactured in Japan. They are destined for the PDVSA Puerto La Cruz refinery in Venezuela where they facilitate the conversion of heavy and extra heavy crude oil into high-quality refined fuel products. The project was awarded to SAL by the Dutch heavy lift specialist Mammoet Logistics.

On its voyage, the MV ‘Lone’ first called the Japanese port of Higashi Harima where two hydrocracking reactors were loaded and continued on to Muroran to take six further hydrotreating reactors on board. From Muroran the vessel sailed through the Panama Canal directly on to the port of Chaguaramas in Trinidad where the reactors are temporarily stored before being carried to their final destination of Puerto La Cruz in Venezuela.

After careful preparation, the reactors were discharged in record time: the heaviest reactor of 1,719t was set ashore in only 2.5 hours. The speed and performance of the loading and discharging operation resulted from a successful interplay between extensive preplanning by the joint team of SAL and Mammoet, the highly skilled and experienced crew, and the state-of-the-art lifting equipment on board.

The human expertise of the SAL crew was accompanied by the necessary infrastructure on board the MV ‘Lone’: a lifting arrangement of 40t and shackles weighing about 4t – equaling the weight of two passenger cars. With this job, the vessel almost fully exploited its unrivalled lifting capacity only weeks after being introduced into the market. From Trinidad, the reactors will eventually be brought to Venezuela by barge.

Together with its sister vessel, SAL’s MV ‘Svenja’, the MV ‘Lone’ is one of the two largest heavy-lift vessels in the world. It has a lifting capacity of 2,000ts, a speed of 20 knots and the Dynamic Positioning System DP2. With these features, the MV ‘Lone’ has all the necessary elements for undertaking highly complex projects for the oil and gas industry as well as for the offshore sector.

Apart from its high performance, the MV “Lone” also possesses an Environmental Passport, which means it meets the highest environmental standards. It is also ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 HSE certified. The heavy lifter measures 160.5m in length and 27.5m in width, and has a loading capacity of 11,000t and 40,000m³ (freight volume).