At 396-meters long and weighing in at a 250,000 tonnes, you’d think that having to do an emergency tow of the world’s largest containership would be no easy task. As it turns out, a recent exercise held March 9th off the coast of France proved that that doesn’t have to be the case.
The exercise was carried out using the French emergency towing vessel, the Abeille Bourbon, while the CMA CGM Marco Polo was on a four hour hiatus from regular service off the Brittany coast.
During the exercise, the Marco Polo was loaded to 80% capacity and towed for an hour at a speed of 10km/h.
The Abeille Bourbon which, at 80 meters long, was dwarfed by the massive containership. Hard to tell though, considering the 200t bollard pull Abeille was able to do the job using only half her engine power.
The Marco Polo is equipped with the Smith Bracket system fore and aft, allowing the Abeille Bourbon to get the tow line in place in just 15 minutes.
CMA CGM says the entire exercise went smoothly from the moment the Marco Polo stopped and started to drift, taking up the tow line and tensioning it, going upwind, and lastly the release and recovery of the line.
While we hope an emergency tow is not in the future of CMA CGM Marco Polo, as any avid gCaptain follower knows; ship happens.
(Bloomberg) — The owner of the shipping yard that built the Titanic is entering administration, a type of insolvency procedure in the UK, for the second time in five years. ...
John Long (Flinders University) Imagine the seas off Peru, 6 million years ago. A group of long-nosed dolphins swam through the warm seawater, breaking the surface with occasional enthusiastic leaps...
Sept 2 (Reuters) – A beluga whale that was suspected of spying for Russia after being discovered in Norwegian waters five years ago has been found dead, according to the non-profit organization...
September 1, 2024
Total Views: 8395
Why Join the gCaptain Club?
Access exclusive insights, engage in vibrant discussions, and gain perspectives from our CEO.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.