McDermott Scoops Up TBM Duo Offshore Gabon

McDermott International, Inc. announced Thursday that one of its subsidiaries has been awarded a fabrication contract for components of a deepwater platform in the Gulf of Mexico, by Heerema Marine Contractors Nederland BV.

McDermott will construct 16 tendon buoyancy modules ("TBMs") for the deepwater project, which will be used during offshore installation of the platform, approximately 225 miles south of New Orleans in waters up to 5,185 feet deep.

"McDermott's high quality fabrication procedures for deepwater projects meet the demanding customer specifications for delivery of structures," said Stephen M. Johnson, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of McDermott. "Additionally, our HSES practices are closely aligned with the stakeholders on the project team," said Johnson.

McDermott will carry out procurement, fabrication and loadout of the TBM structures from its Morgan City facility in Louisiana. Consisting of an upper and lower module, each TBM is designed to be interchangeable as either an upper or a lower module. Fabrication work is expected to commence during the second quarter of 2012.

A McDermott subsidiary has also been awarded a design engineering and procurement management contract, by VAALCO Gabon Inc., for the Etame platform and a design engineering contract for a potential Southeast Etame / North Tchibala (SEENT) platform, both located offshore Gabon, West Africa.

"McDermott's Houston-based engineering teams have a track record of designing structures for the West Africa market," said Johnson. "Our early planning activities and knowledge of the technical issues that may arise during the design scope, coupled with our unique understanding of fabrication and installation constructability requirements, allowed us to develop a robust design proposal for VAALCO," said Johnson.

The new oil and gas wellhead production platform(s) will be located in the Etame Marin block off the coast of Gabon and will be engineered to produce oil and gas.

VAALCO has requested McDermott's engineering team to design a safe, reliable and predictable production facility that will minimize operational and maintenance issues. It is anticipated that engineering activities will be supported by a combination of technical and commercial personnel focused on identifying and specifying the materials and services necessary to help ensure project execution excellence.

Detailed engineering is already underway at the McDermott Houston engineering office.

The values of both these contract awards will be included in McDermott's second quarter 2012 backlog.

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