Nexans Acquires Cable-Laying Vessel

Nexans

Nexans, the worldwide leader in the cable industry, has signed a contract with Bourbon Cable AS, a Norwegian subsidiary of the French company Bourbon, to purchase the C/S Bourbon Skagerrak, one of the world's most powerful cable-laying vessels. Nexans has operated her exclusively for many years within the framework of its submarine high voltage energy cables activities. She will be renamed C/S Nexans Skagerrak and will continue to serve customers worldwide.

"This purchase confirms Nexans' commitment to the submarine cable and umbilical markets and underlines our strategy to provide our customers with a comprehensive turnkey service from design, development and manufacture to installation," says Yvon Raak, Nexans' Executive Vice President Europe Area.

Skagerrak's involvement in major submarine cable projects Nexans has retained operational control of the C/S Skagerrak on a long-term charter basis for many years, during which time she has been involved in a variety of major submarine cable projects such as: both power links between Spain and Morocco (1997 and 2005); the Gemini project in the Gulf of Mexico (1999); the Abu Safah project in Saudi Arabia (2004). C/S Skagerrak is currently involved in the NorNed link between Norway and the Netherlands which, at 580 km, will be the world's longest high-voltage submarine power link.

State of the art cable-laying vessel

The C/S Skagerrak was the first purpose-built vessel to be designed specially for the transport and installation of submarine high-voltage power cables and umbilicals. To date, there are only two vessels of this kind in the world. The vessel is currently equipped with a 7,000 tonne capacity 29 m diameter turntable, a computer based laying control system and a state of the art dynamic positioning system, and can also deploy Nexans' specialist Capjet ROV trenching systems for cable burial operations.

About the C/S Nexans Skagerrak

  • Length (including laying wheels) – 106 m (about the same length as a typical car ferry)
  • Breadth – 32.15 m
  • Deadweight – 7,886 tonnes
  • Vessel speed – 10 knots
  • Accommodation – 49 single cabins plus one hospital cabin

The vessel can be fitted with additional cable handling equipment to perform operations such as: cable repairs, including submarine cutting and retrieval of damaged sections; simultaneous laying of two cables with controlled separation; piggyback laying.

Nexans is the worldwide leader in the cable industry. The Group brings an extensive range of advanced copper and optical fiber cable solutions to the infrastructure, industry and building markets. Nexans cables and cabling systems can be found in every area of people's lives, from telecommunications and energy networks, to aerospace, automotive, railways, building, petrochemical, medical applications, etc. With an industrial presence in 29 countries and commercial activities worldwide, Nexans employs 20,000 people and had sales in 2005 of 5.4 billion euros.


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