Cortland Australia Bags Singapore Contract
Engineered rope specialist Cortland Australia said it has secured a contract to supply Singapore’s ASL Shipyards with high performance Plasma 12x12 towlines for BHP Billiton Towage Services’s new fleet of six RAstar85 ASD escort tugs.
The specifically developed ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene Plasma (HMPE) ropes will be the largest used on-board escort tugs in Australia. They will be deployed in Port Hedland, Western Australia.
ASL is currently building six escort tugs for BHP Billiton’s Iron Ore Operations at the world’s largest bulk tonnage export port and each will be fitted with high performance Plasma 12x12 packages manufactured by Cortland.
Cortland has also been awarded the cyclone mooring lines package, which includes installation and fabrication of all mooring lines on-site in Port Hedland when the tug fleet arrives.
Cortland will supply LoCo Plasma 12x12 mainlines, LoCo Plasma 12x12 intermediate working lines and lightweight LoCo Plasma 12x12 grommet lines.
In addition to manufacturing custom mooring lines, Cortland has engineering capabilities to perform mooring line analysis which becomes crucial when working in the cyclone regions of Australia.
The six vessels under construction are Robert Allan Naval Architects and Marine Engineering designed RAstar escort class tugs with top of the range render/recover Markey Machinery DESF-48 winches.