Purpose-built Daughter Craft Delivered to Aberdeen
Unique Group, an integrated turnkey subsea and offshore solution provider, has now delivered two new dive systems and a diving vessel worth around £5 million to global services provider, Vertech.
The Hydracraft 1500 Daughter Craft vessel, named the Vaila, is nearly 50 feet long and designed for air diving activity. The hull is designed to provide an enhanced stability, optimizing operational efficiency.
Unique Group’s UK Managing Director, Ray Hughes, handed the vessel over to Vertech’s UK Managing Director, John Marsden, and Vertech’s Diving Manager, Alan Melia in Aberdeen last week.
The Vaila is the first Daughter Craft which has been built for purpose, from concept through to design. Other vessels used for the same purposes have been conversions of existing craft. The daughter craft system is designed for conducting diving operations for underwater inspection in locations otherwise inaccessible by larger vessels.
The project was initiated when Vertech (under their previous identity, Global Diving) formed a new commercial diving entity. They approached Unique for surface diving systems and so the concept development for the Daughter Craft began in May 2014.
The Vaila can hold a maximum of 10 people and will be based at a North-East port, with the ability to deploy anywhere around the world. It has its own single launch and recovery system, the Macgregor G150 Davit, which is the largest lifting davit manufactured by Macgregor to date.
